


This Insignificant Pride and Prejudice

by Mysecretfanmoments, Pouler (poulerslashes)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, non-canonical family headcanons, the resentment is real
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-02
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 14:11:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 33,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7364587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mysecretfanmoments/pseuds/Mysecretfanmoments, https://archiveofourown.org/users/poulerslashes/pseuds/Pouler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oikawa Tooru graduated high school with the burning desire to succeed in his college career. He'd hoped that might include taking down his arch-nemesis along the way, but when he finds that his college team hosts an offensively familiar face, he can't help but think that the universe might be conspiring against him. After all, what could be worse than playing on the same team as Ushijima?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> mysecretfanmoments: This collaboration fic has been so. much. fun. I hope you'll enjoy it too! With huge thanks to Paula for all the WIP laughter & enjoyment and to Carole & the anon who helped put this idea in my head a while before this was written: http://mysecretfanmoments.tumblr.com/post/142455084672/idk-if-you-ship-ushioi-but-please-consider-ushioi -- It's not a faithful Pride and Prejudice au, but we hope you can spot the few areas of overlap!
> 
> poulerslashes: almost exactly one month ago I messaged Val super-casual: Oh, Hey. Are you interested in playing around with a low-pressure round-robin? Like, idk, a hundred words or two and then take turns. And then it turned into a furious behemoth where we were writing a thousand words at a time and peeking over each others shoulders full eyeball emoji in delight at what was happening. I enjoyed the hell out of it. I hope you do too!

When Oikawa Tooru thought about what his life would be like when he went off to college, he’d imagined things a certain way. He’d expected a new city, a new life. He’d expected pretty girls in all his classes. He’d expected dorm life to be an adjustment, but who wouldn’t love living with him, after all? And he’d expected a lot of things from volleyball: a different caliber of teammate, new faces and personalities and styles to adapt to, and practices that were lengthy and challenging.

What he had _not_ expected, not in a million years, was to walk into the locker room on the first day of pre-semester training and see Ushijima standing there as though he belonged.

Tooru had a moment of dumbfounded shock before he blurted, “What the hell are you doing here?”

Ushijima looked at him. “Oikawa,” he said. “I’m here for training camp.”

“You’re not,” Tooru said, before his mind had a chance to catch up with his mouth. It was more to himself than Ushijima: _Ushijima is not here, and this is just a bad dream_.

“I am.”

Tooru glanced at his new teammates, halfway hoping they’d be looking at him strangely, wondering why he was talking to himself. Surely the Ushijima standing before him was a spectre sent to torture him, and it would disappear once Tooru repented.

 _Dear God,_ Tooru began, folding his hands together but keeping his eyes pinned to Spectre-jima. _I’m sorry for always letting Takeru eat candy before handing him back to his parents…_

“Ushijima!” one of the coaches called, interrupting his repentance. The name was cold water down Tooru’s spine: not a hallucination, then. The coach continued, looking straight at Ushijima, “Is your health form up to date?”

Tooru was left staring as Not-a-spectre-jima went to talk to the coach. He stood very still, trying to come to terms with the fact that Ushijima was his new teammate. For the next few years they’d be stuck together, unless one of them—Ushijima, let it be Ushijima—got injured or dropped out. It was not a happy realization.

How was he meant to cope? Ushijima was his rival, the guy whose stone-like face and ultimate confidence had driven him to work himself to the bone in high school. And now they were meant to work _together_ ? Working together was losing. Working together meant giving up on the dream of one day gripping the back of Ushijima’s head and driving his face into the dust and saying, _Look at what my team can do! This is what you’re up against; this is why you were found wanting._ Tooru wasn’t ready to give up on that dream.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t ready to give up on his scholarship either, and that meant he was stuck for the time being. It didn’t stop him from calling Iwaizumi the moment he got back to his room, though, and by some miracle, Iwaizumi picked up on the second ring.

“Ushiwaka-chan is at my school,” Tooru said, even before Iwaizumi had said _hello_.

“Ah,” said Iwaizumi. Then, in measured tones: “It’s a good school.”

“Don’t pretend you don’t hate him too.”

“Mm. Sucks to be you.”

Finally: some sympathy, if Tooru could call it that. He decided he could, and launched into his whining session—which he’d rehearsed in his head all through practice, cataloguing infuriating details as he tossed and ran and dived. He finished with a strong:

“I’m not working with Ushiwaka-chan. He’s a gorilla.”

“I thought I was a gorilla?”

“Yes, but you’re a _fun_ gorilla, and he’s that gorilla who attacked a lady at the zoo. With worse hair. I’m being punished, Iwa-chan. Punished for my sins.”

“You’re giving your sins too much credit.” There was a pause. “Or too little.”

“It’s not funny!”

“It’s a little funny.”

Tooru nearly tore his hair out. “Listen, this is serious! I really think this must be some cosmic joke! The universe is out to get me!”

“I don’t think the universe cares that much about you,” Iwaizumi returned flatly.

“Iwa-chan!”

“The Wheel of Fate doesn’t turn on what does and does not annoy Oikawa Tooru.”

“You don’t seem to be getting the full horror of my situation!” Tooru tried spelling it out. “Just imagine it! I’ll have to play with that ox! I’ll have to set to him and pretend I’m pleased to do so!”

“Sounds pretty rough.”

“ _Iwa-chan!_ ” Tooru practically hissed into phone. “I’ll have to look at him every day and remember what he said about our team. About you. About everyone. And then I’ll have to act like he was _right_.”

Iwaizumi didn’t immediately respond after that. Finally, he said, “Well, what then? Are you going to quit?”

“I don’t know,” Tooru said. He grimaced. “No,” he corrected, “because that would be even worse. It would be letting him win again.”

“Good,” Iwaizumi said, voice sharp. “What are you gonna do about it besides whine at me when I should be studying?”

“I don’t know,” Tooru repeated acidly. “I guess I’ll have to make _him_ quit.”

“Don’t get yourself kicked off the team, Shittykawa.”

“You know I’m more cunning than that!”

“Cunning is not how I’d describe the kid who got stuck in the dishwasher.”

“ _I was eight_! And you’re one to talk! Why are you studying? Classes don’t start ‘til next week.” He stifled a laugh into his hand. “Are you that bad off, Iwa-chan? Is that jock brain of yours behind the curve already?”

“You’re lucky I can’t punch you through the phone.”

“No, really, I’m concerned. Maybe we should get you a tutor or something.”

“Maybe I’ll just come and punch you anyway, the train ride really isn’t that long...”

“Don’t you dare,” Tooru said, worried Iwaizumi might actually deliver. He changed tracks: “I’ve already been punished enough.”

“I guess you have,” Iwaizumi said. He sighed. “Look, just don’t get in trouble. I’m sorry he’s on your team, but you might just have to get used to it.”

Tooru hmphed. “I certainly don’t intend to.”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” Iwaizumi said—but there was a smile in his voice, and Tooru decided to take it as approval. He was fighting for their old team’s honor, after all.

 

After Tooru’s resolution to make Ushijima’s life a living hell, it got easier to deal with him being on the team. In fact, there was something refreshing about being sugary sweet to Ushijima while plotting his ultimate downfall, even though Ushijima’s stubborn refusal to notice anything strange about it was off-putting. It was like plotting the downfall of a slab of concrete—but the slab of concrete had insulted his friends and his choices repeatedly, and Tooru was determined to push it over.

He had to start small. He had to be patient. A mountain of this magnitude could not be climbed in a day. The opportunities would present themselves, Tooru told himself. He would find Ushijima’s misery in everyday things, compound it over time, and drive him into an early grave.

“Oikawa,” the ox said when he approached in the locker room after practice during their second week of classes.

Tooru gritted his teeth, his shoulders tensing instinctively at the sound of Ushijima’s voice. He was leaning over the bench to pack his bag, and by the time he got the zipper done, he’d managed to rearrange his features into a smile. “Ushiwaka-chan,” he singsonged, “just the man I wanted to see!”

He straightened up and turned, though his smile almost splintered when he finally put eyes on That Offensive Face.

Ushijima didn’t even have the decency to look surprised by his friendliness. “What is your plan for dinner?” he asked, in the same dull tone as before.

Tooru drew up the persona he used on reporters and rude fans, flapping a hand and using an airy tone of voice. What concern of Ushijima’s was his dinner plan? Did he plan to bully Tooru into a more nutritious regimen?

“No plans yet,” he said. “Leftovers, maybe.”

“Would you like to come with me?”

“To dinner?”

Ushijima nodded.

Tooru was about to arch a brow and ask why when he remembered it was his mission in life to make Ushijima miserable, and dinner was a good start. “Sure. Teammates should get to know each other, shouldn’t they?”

Another nod, and then he was following Ushijima out of the gym and off campus, to the street filled with restaurants catering mostly to students.

They passed group after group, each laughing and chatting amongst themselves. Tooru felt himself groan internally—wasn’t college supposed to give him the opportunity to meet new people, make new friends? Wasn’t he supposed to be the one who went out after hours in a good mood?

He stared at Ushijima’s back as they walked along the street. He hadn’t said a single word to Tooru since they left the gym.

“So!” Tooru started. “Do you come out here to the strip a lot? Did you have a particular place in mind, or…?”

“There is a restaurant I enjoy,” came the reply.

Then silence again.

Tooru frowned. How was he supposed to scout information to ruin Ushijima like this? He tried once more. “I never know where to try! Just gotta take the risk of a new place sometimes, I guess.”

Ushijima grunted.

Tooru’s frown turned into a scowl. Maybe he could just turn around and walk back to campus. Ushijima probably wouldn’t even notice if he did.

“Perhaps…”

Tooru’s ears pricked. He lifted his head in amazement.

“Perhaps,” Ushijima said again, “you could consider looking for reviews online. To ensure the restaurant you are choosing is of acceptable quality to past patrons.”

God. Was Ushijima just a robot in a skin suit? No wonder his spike was so strong. “I should have thought of that!” Tooru said, surprised that he could still speak with his jaw clenched so tight.

“I’ve found it useful.”

The rest of the walk passed in silence; Tooru was incapable of further speech, anyway. There was something so disconcerting about Ushijima’s entire attitude: there were no chinks in the armor, and Tooru had to consider the horrifying possibility that Ushijima really was the emotionless monolith he seemed to be. No—not emotionless. Driven only by a will to improve, and be the best. He found himself wondering if Ushijima had ever read fiction or played a video game.

“We’re here,” Ushijima said, pushing open the door to a small restaurant off the main drag. It was more like a hole in the wall than the sprawling family establishments Tooru used to go to at home. His own Seijou fan club would barely fit in this place, but the smell when the door opened was heady. From Ushijima’s demeanor he’d half-expected to be brought to a place that sold nutrition capsules.

“May I order for you?” Ushijima asked.

 _What?_ “You don’t know what I like.”

“You’re picky?” This was said with mild interest, like it was a possibility Ushijima hadn’t considered thus far.

Tooru held up his hands. “No, no. Go ahead, Ushiwaka-chan. I’m sure you know what’s best.” The heavy irony was lost on Ushijima; Tooru reached for his wallet. “Oh!” he said, pretending not to find it. “I don’t have money with me. Looks like you’ll have to eat alone—”

“Go sit down,” Ushijima said. “I will pay.”

Tooru did as he was told, realizing he’d missed his chance to order the most expensive thing on the menu. He should have insisted on ordering his own food at the till, but Ushijima was still being forced to pay for an extra meal. That was something.

Tooru chose a table next to a western-facing window. The sun was going down, and it sent hot slats of blinding light into the small dining room. He purposely sat with his back to the window so Ushijima would have to sit across from him.

When Ushijima sat down a few minutes later, the bright parallelogram of sunlight terminated just below his nose. Tooru cursed internally. It would have hit him right in the eyes.

Ushijima folded his hands on the table. “The food will be out promptly,” he said.

Tooru sat back with his arms crossed and made a noncommittal noise in reply. He knew better than to do it. He knew all the tips about open body language versus closed—but he was tired and frustrated, and now that he sat in the wonderfully aromatic restaurant, he realized he was also starving.

Ushijima didn’t fidget. He didn’t play with the condiments on the table or readjust his chair. He sat ramrod straight and looked out the window over Tooru’s shoulder.

Tooru hated him. He really hated him.

He reached down and flicked a packet of sugar out of the dish. When he glanced around the restaurant, he didn’t see any other people their age. In fact, he didn’t see many people at all. “So what’s so special about this place?” he mumbled.

“Special?” Ushijima echoed.

“Yeah. I mean, you chose it for a reason, right?” Tooru shrugged. “What makes it special? What makes Ushijima Wakatoshi choose a restaurant?” He felt his lips curl into a grin just as his nose crinkled in disgust. “Online reviews?” he suggested.

“No,” Ushijima said.

“No?” Tooru prompted.

“I asked Coach Yamamura where he enjoyed eating.”

The answer was so stupid and straightforward that Tooru wanted to smack himself in the forehead. He wasn’t sure what he had expected—had he expected something profound or touching? Something _human_? It seemed like too much to ask for, and part of him felt almost sorry for Ushijima. How could he make real friends with all that bland stoicism between him and everyone he talked to? Had he even realised what he was saying to Tooru all those years?

“Do you have hobbies?” he tried.

Ushijima’s head inclined slightly. “Besides volleyball?”

“Obviously. I didn’t think you considered that a hobby.”

“I don’t. Others do.” He thought for a moment. “Walking.”

“For exercise?”

“For enjoyment. My family has dogs. They come with me.”

Tooru imagined it for a moment. He could see it in front of him: Ushijima out in the hills with two large dogs gamboling about beside him, obviously fond of their human. Ushijima would be wearing hiking boots and a fleece sweater, and it would be an ad in some sort of outdoor sports magazine. It annoyed Tooru that the image seemed so right, instead of being incongruous and amusing.

Then again, everything annoyed him just now, and he was relieved when the food arrived; even he wasn’t this cranky on a regular basis.

Plate after plate landed on the table between them, delivered by a stooped old woman with knobbled hands from a tray held by a middle-aged man in an apron and chef’s cap. Steaming bowls of soup, potatoes simmered with beef, grilled skewers of chicken, tofu and Chinese broccoli, steamed greens tossed in a lightly fragrant sauce, plates of eggplant and lotus root and scallions and shredded carrot and daikon. Tooru goggled at the sight.

“Thank you for the food,” Ushijima said over Tooru’s shocked silence.

“How much did you order?!” Tooru hissed when the man and woman went off again toward the kitchen. If he’d been disappointed for not ordering expensively before, the thought went out the window at the large spread between them. It seemed enough food for four people, let alone just the two of them.

“It’s important to ingest a proper balance of protein and carbohydrates after the physical exertion of practice—”

“Quit quoting the textbook of basic health at me!” Tooru demanded.

Ushijima stopped talking. His dour expression did not change. Tooru covered his face with his hand. So much for polite conversation.

Tooru’s stomach growled despite his displeasure. He scowled and lowered his hand, then used it to pick up his chopsticks. He dug into the plate nearest to him and shoved the food directly into his mouth.

He froze.

It tasted like home. Tooru’s own mom had never been much of a cook, but it was just like something Iwaizumi’s mom might make. Tooru lowered his chopsticks and stared in disbelief at the table.

“Is it acceptable?” Ushijima asked. Tooru realized he still hadn’t moved.

“It’s amazing,” Tooru admitted, unable to lie.

Ushijima nodded matter-of-factly. He began to portion out his share of the variety of dishes.

“Why do you like this place?” Tooru asked as he watched Ushijima fill his plate.

“It is the same as any other restaurant,” Ushijima said. Then he paused momentarily, his hand hesitating as he surveyed the table. “I suppose,” he added slowly, “that it reminds me of my grandmother’s cooking.” He looked up at Tooru after the admission. The sun had sunk a bit lower, and half of his face glowed in the golden light. It softened his hard features. Ushijima gestured at the food. “Please help yourself, Oikawa.”

Tooru did as he was told, his tongue thick in his throat. He’d wanted confirmation that Ushijima had actual feelings and now he had it. Ushijima’s voice had softened, gone tentative, just for a moment. Why had Tooru wanted that again?

As his belly filled, his ability to act returned too. It was easier now to keep a conversation going, the teasing lilt in his voice lost on Ushijima, who always replied seriously. Unfortunately, it was that implacability that made it impossible to get a rise out of him; not even mentioning nationals last year caused so much as a flicker of annoyance. It would have been more upsetting if the food wasn’t so good.

“You should eat more,” Ushijima said when Tooru was well and truly stuffed. Ushijima seemed to be done too, but there was still food left. “Beyond your natural appetite. The training we do demands it.”

“Not all of us rely on brute force,” Tooru said automatically, because his usual response to criticism was to criticise back.

“What’s your serve, then?”

Tooru smiled. “Precision _and_ brute force.”

And then Ushijima smiled back, and Tooru wanted to tell him that the smile hadn’t been for him, but there was no way to casually take back a smile; he had to let it stand. It soured his mood, though, reminding him where he was and with whom.

“Time to go,” he said. “Thank you for the meal, Ushiwaka-chan. That really hit the spot!”

He’d hoped Ushijima might stay for longer, but it wasn’t to be; they walked out together—calling thanks to the kitchen staff—and Tooru was grateful when it was time for them to part ways. He said his overly cheerful goodbyes and walked home in the gathering dusk, pulling his phone from his bag.

This time, he had to call Iwaizumi twice before he answered.

“What?” Iwaizumi said, and Tooru launched into his story, relaying everything that had happened in the course of the evening.

“He’s ruining my life,” Tooru concluded.

“Yes, by buying you dinner. He is quite the mastermind.”

“Why’s he being so nice?” Tooru continued. “You should’ve seen him, Iwa-chan. I could’ve sworn he was almost a person.”

“You’re suggesting that he’s a human being? Now I _am_ concerned.”

“I don’t think he realizes we’re supposed to be enemies. He doesn’t seem to care that we played against each other. It’s like it doesn’t even _register_.”

“Okay, that does piss me off.”

“I’ll keep working on it,” Tooru said. “There’s got to be something that’s gonna make him crack.” He grimaced. “If it takes a hundred years, I’ll figure out how to make him miserable.”

“It better not take a hundred years for you to get through college.”

“Don’t worry.” Tooru felt a grin curl at the corner of his mouth. “I’ll figure it out.”

“Yeah, now I won’t worry at all.”

“Aw! Are you saying you do worry about me, Iwa-chan?”  
  
“Goodnight, Oikawa,” came the response, and then a tone signalling the call had ended.

Tooru locked his phone and shoved it into his pocket. He felt invigorated. Sure, Ushijima was a brick wall, and sure, he hadn’t picked up on Tooru’s blatant hatred or his cloyingly sweet behavior, and _sure_ , it had royally pissed Tooru off. But Tooru had never been the sort of person to back down from a challenge, especially the ones surrounding Ushijima Wakatoshi.

Tooru hiked his bag up his shoulder and started to jog in the direction of his dormitory. _Tomorrow_ , he thought. He’d start in earnest tomorrow.

 

The next morning, he found Ushijima outside the cafeteria. He stood near the exterior doors in the cool damp air with all the personality of a statue. Less personality, even. He didn’t have his phone out like any other self-respecting young adult; he simply stood there, looking forward, until he happened to catch sight of Tooru.

“Good morning,” Ushijima said as Tooru approached the doors.

“Good morning?” Tooru said in response. He took in the way Ushijima followed him into the cafeteria. Suspicion tickled the back of his brain. “Were you waiting for me?”

“I thought you might appreciate company for breakfast,” Ushijima replied.

“What?” Tooru couldn’t believe it. Ushijima hadn’t gotten the hint the night before. Well… on second thought, it was very believable.

Tooru was too sleepy to argue. “Okay…” he concluded after a lengthy pause.

“The hot bar has soup,” Ushijima said as he fell into step beside Tooru. “And the main line’s options seem very adequate today.”

“You… scoped it out first.”

“Of course. Morning practice is strenuous, and we should always—” He stopped talking abruptly.

Tooru glanced over to him. Ushijima’s mouth was shut into a tight line. His eyebrows hung even lower over his eyes than usual. Tooru prompted, “We should always...?”

“You asked that I not make recommendations of basic health anymore,” Ushijima said.

“Oh my god,” Tooru muttered under his breath. It was altogether too early for his morning to be so surreal.

Ushijima tagged with him all the way through the line and up to the drink cooler. Tooru happened to notice two things in rapid succession. First, there was only one strawberry milk remaining in the cooler. Second, Ushijima opened the door and began to reach for it.

Quickly, before his mind caught up to his instincts, Tooru’s hand shot forward and snatched the milk before Ushijima.

“Do you mind?” he said. “It’s my favorite.”

“Of course,” Ushijima said calmly, before selecting lowfat milk instead.

Tooru almost cursed. He didn’t even like strawberry milk—but he’d drink it down out of spite, anyway, and try not to think how his plan to ruin Ushijima seemed to inconvenience him more than it did its intended target. Sometime soon he’d hit the mark; he could sense it. He could feel it in his strawberry milk fortified bones.

  


As luck would have it, he got his chance for a better prank later that day. Getting Ushijima to buy him dinner with the forgot-my-wallet trick and taking the last strawberry milk were one type of mean, and they could be taken in stride. Removing all the towels in the locker room while Ushijima was still showering—the oldest prank in the book—well, that was a different matter. Tooru had to stifle gleeful giggles as he pushed stacks of pristine towels into his own locker after practice the next day. Ushijima was the only person on the team still out on the court, doing that masochistic Shiratorizawa one-hundred serves thing. Tooru knew, because he’d been doing fifty, and would have done a hundred if he hadn’t had towel mayhem on the brain.

He didn’t stick around the locker room after the crime had been committed, but he found a reason to be outside the gym waiting, pretending he was making a phone call. It took a long time for Ushijima to appear, his hair dripping.

“Bye!” Tooru said to an imaginary caller, making sure the timing seemed coincidental. He turned to Ushijima and widened his eyes theatrically. “You’re dripping wet! What happened?”

Here came the confession, that all the towels had been gone and someone would pay --

“The towels were gone,” Ushijima said.

“Oh, that’s horrible! Who would do such a thing?”

“Do?” Ushijima echoed.

Tooru blinked. “Who would take all the towels as a prank,” he clarified, halfway to being stumped. Ushijima realized there was deliberate malice behind the lack of towels, didn’t he?

Ushijima inclined his head. “I doubt it was a prank. There must have been an accident for them all to be dirty.”

“At our university?” Tooru asked, trying to sound like he considered it a possibility. “The facilities here aren’t like some dingy high school club.” _Although thankfully they leave the towels unattended._

Ushijima shrugged. “It wasn’t a problem.” He moved his head slightly in what Tooru had come to recognise as a _let’s walk_ command, and Tooru found himself following, stewing over Ushijima’s easy response. He was so… unruffled. By everything. In fact, Tooru was beginning to suspect that the only thing that would infuriate Ushijima was the one thing he wouldn’t do: suck at volleyball.

Well, that wasn’t true. He could start rumors, ruin Ushijima’s reputation with the others, try his hand at online harassment… but the thought of that made his stomach twist in anticipatory guilt. Could he really go that far? If Ushijima had been a smirking villain he might have been able to, but Ushijima hadn’t smirked. Every compliment during practice sounded meant, even if they made Tooru’s jaw clench. It made it hard to imagine resorting to truly awful acts in this vendetta, and he kept to smaller crimes. Over the following weeks, he tried a number of tactics to goad a reaction out of Ushijima. He continued taking the strawberry milk when it was in short supply; he slipped a handful of soil into Ushijima’s outdoor shoes three days in a row; he stole Ushijima’s phone and texted cheesy emoji-filled messages to likely contacts. To his infinite frustration, nothing seemed to work. Ushijima hadn’t even given him so much as an eyebrow twitch. And even worse, Ushijima seemed to always be around: in the morning at breakfast, outside his classroom, and always, always, always waiting in the locker room after practice. Tooru had been treated to dinner no less than eight times since that first weird evening, half of which had been at the homey restaurant that Ushijima introduced him to. More infuriating than that, Tooru found himself almost _used_ to the constant company. There were a few times that he would leave a class, and there would be no stern-faced giant in the hallway waiting for him, and he would find himself almost disappointed.

The worst part, though, was the fact that—as much as Tooru wanted to deny it—practicing with Ushijima was incredible. Made him feel incredible. To connect his set with a spike so powerful, there was no way to describe it. Sometimes, in the heat of the moment, when the team seemed to move with one mind and the plays snapped together like clockwork, Tooru could almost forget they were supposed to be enemies.

 _Almost_.

  


“Oikawa-san!”

Tooru turned. It was one of the first truly warm days in May, and he’d been lost in his mind as he enjoyed the breeze and the scent of summer approaching. He was on his way to physics class—early as usual—but he welcomed the delay. He welcomed almost any human interaction that didn’t involve Ushijima these days.

A few girls approached him from one of the groups of students sprawled on the grass between buildings. He recognized their faces from the crowd of people who usually came to the team’s practice matches, and greeted them the way he used to greet his fans.

One of them giggled nervously, and he smiled. _This is who I am_ , he thought. _Not the idiot who hangs out with Ushijima 24/7._

“Is there anything I can do for you?” he asked sweetly. Their attention was balm to his weary soul.

“You were great,” the tallest girl said. “Last match, in the second set when you got to play—I couldn’t believe you took that dump shot!”

Tooru’s grin widened. The girl’s build was athletic, and he thought her interest in volleyball might extend beyond the supposedly eligible guys who played it. “It’s petty of me,” he said, “But I love to see the looks on their faces after a dump shot.”

The girls laughed. A different one said, “Well, they were all preparing for a spike from that big guy.”

Tooru tried not to stiffen visibly even as his grin turned false. “Ushiwaka-chan is hard to ignore, that’s for sure!”

“Oikawa-san,” a third girl said seriously. “Is there anyone special in your life?”

Now they were getting to the point. “I can’t give away all my secrets so easily,” he said. He didn’t know if these girls qualified as fans, but he’d found that an air of mystery helped keep a crowd engaged.

“What about Ushijima-san? Does he have a girlfriend?”

Tooru laughed; he couldn’t help himself. The thought of Ushijima dating anyone was hilarious. What would his confession be like? Would it include a list of pros and cons? When he sobered from this image, he coughed. “You’ll have to ask him,” he said.

“He’s a little intimidating,” one of the girls said.

“Oh, he’d love to talk about these things with you! Trust me, he seems intimidating, but he’s a huge teddy bear on the inside—” Tooru trailed off when he noticed the girls looking at something behind him. He’d seen enough comedies to turn before saying more, and he was right to do so; Ushijima was wandering up the path behind them.

“Oikawa,” he greeted. Then a nod at the girls. “Ladies.”

Ushijima’s entry earned two nervous giggles where Tooru’s had only earned one; Tooru put that down to the intimidation factor rather than charm. Had Ushijima heard him say the teddy-bear-on-the-inside thing?

“Ask him now!” one of the girls hissed under her breath, and Tooru was caught between wanting to hear Ushijima flounder and wanting to never ever hear Ushijima talk about his romantic life. He was robbed of his choice when one of them plucked up the courage to ask the same question they’d asked him.

“Is there anyone special in your life, Ushijima-san?”

Tooru braced himself for awkwardness, but Ushijima answered quickly and resolutely.

“Yes.”

There was a chorus of gasps, and Tooru had to keep his nose from wrinkling in annoyance. Ushijima hadn’t seemed the least bit discomfited.

“Won’t you be late for class?” Ushijima asked him, and Tooru looked at his watch. He sighed. He should’ve been surprised that Ushijima knew his schedule, but he wasn’t; his life had reached new lows.

“Unfortunately. Goodbye, ladies. Goodbye, Ushiwaka-chan.”

Ushijima looked like he meant to follow, but as Tooru moved away the girls crowded around him, and one of them asked another question. Tooru rolled his eyes skyward, thoroughly offended that girls who’d come to see him were happy to take Ushijima as his replacement. _Ushijima!_ Didn’t they have taste?

He compiled an imaginary lecture about Ushijima’s many faults all the way to class, oblivious to soft May weather and the smell of early summer.

  


Class dragged on interminably. The physics professor was at least eighty years old, and had a low buzzing voice not unlike the sound of bees over a blossoming field. Tooru found his eyes sliding sideways to the window, where the bright afternoon sunlight teased through the glass.

Yes. Ushijima had said _yes_. Tooru had been so disappointed that Ushijima hadn’t seemed embarrassed or awkward in that moment that he hadn’t realized the implications of such an answer. Ushijima told those girls he had someone ‘special’.

Ushijima had a girlfriend. A _girlfriend_ . _Ushijima_!

The thought that Ushijima had a girlfriend while Tooru didn’t… a hot spike of sheer hatred stabbed into his brain stem. Tooru heard a faint ripping noise and realized he had torn the last three pages of his class notes right out of his notebook.

It couldn’t be possible, right? There would be no way that anyone could tolerate Ushijima in large quantities. Tooru sat up straighter. Perhaps Ushijima had misunderstood the implied meaning of the question. ‘Special’ could mean many things to someone as pedantic as him. Maybe he thought it meant his parents or any siblings—or even his dogs, apparently. Maybe he thought it meant the old woman at the restaurant, who always brought their food without a word, but on the last visit had patted both their hands with a grandmotherly air.

Yes, that had to be it, Tooru decided. The alternative being that Ushijima was more romantically successful than him—that was too much to bear.

He hoped the girls would force Ushijima to admit the special person was his grandmother, or something similarly pathetic. No, never mind; they’d count that as part of his rustic charm. Resenting Ushijima’s possible success was hopeless. It was time to stop worrying about Ushijima’s appeal and accept that not everyone had taste. For the time being it seemed—

Tooru took a breath, looked at his physics professor, found no help from that quarter. He took another deep, unwilling breath, and finished his thought. For the time being, it seemed that he was stuck with Ushijima, and he might as well accept it. The pranks weren’t working, and while Ushijima hadn’t apologised for the things he’d said in high school, he also hadn’t repeated them. That was enough. Tooru could accept that, if only for his own peace of mind. There was no need for him and Ushijima ever to be _friends_ , after all.

Perhaps Ushijima sensed his resignation in practice that day. Tooru’s form was perfect; his body moved exactly as he wished; the ball went exactly where he sent it. There was a grin from Ushijima during the last half hour when the team faced off against itself, a practice that had gotten a lot more interesting now that Tooru and Ushijima were reliably put on the opposite team from the usual setter and ace. They lost often, but they always fought tooth and nail not to.

Tooru would have grinned when Ushijima’s spike won them the set—if he hadn’t realized Ushijima was already grinning, and he didn’t want Ushijima to look round and see him grinning back.

 _A good setter uses his tools_ , Tooru reminded himself when guilt constricted his throat, memories of Seijou’s losses hanging like a millstone around his shoulders. He’d be a fool not to use a good player to the fullest; the player’s personality or past didn’t matter in the least, unless it affected his play.

He wasn’t betraying anyone or anything. It was just volleyball.

It would have been easier to get over the Seijou defeats if Ushijima didn’t still seem to be always at his elbow. The ox kept his place the same as he had the weeks previous, waiting outside Tooru’s classroom, the cafeteria, the gym. In his glumness, Tooru found he couldn’t muster the strength to gripe at Ushijima about it.

He could be petty about it, though.

“Here,” he’d say, and he’d shove his gym bag at Ushijima.

“Carry this,” as he handed over his books.

“Bring my breakfast to the table,” he’d order before sitting down at a table empty-handed, leaving Ushijima to get both trays.

Ushijima took it all in stride with his usual level of dullness. Tooru’s tray always came back with strawberry milk. It was getting to the point where Tooru was starting to enjoy strawberry milk, as if his tastebuds had resigned themselves to fate alongside the rest of him.

One thing was certain: if he’d hoped that asking for an endless string of favors would eventually make Ushijima dissociate from him, that was another useless fantasy. Nothing seemed to annoy him.

In fact, the more Tooru shoved at him, the more he seemed to rise to the occasion. Books, trays, his bag, these were small things. Tooru began asking for more: he forgot his train pass, would Ushijima lend him his? (He would.) He ordered a bookcase off the internet, could Ushijima put it together? (He could.) He needed a nice outfit for his cousin’s wedding, would Ushijima join him for the mind-numbing experience of watching someone else buy clothes? (He did.)

Ushijima seemed incapable of refusing, and it made Tooru furious.

Eventually, it got to be too much. It was June. The sun was blazing outside the gym, where they’d all gone to sit on the grass and groan about the ruthlessness of their coaches. Tooru had been out in the sun with the others, but—mindful of his skin, and that he didn’t want to be bright red tomorrow—he’d wandered into the shade on the other side of the building, away from the rest of the team. He could still hear their laughter, but he wasn’t frying.

Of course, Ushijima joined him. And of course, he’d brought Tooru a water bottle like it was no big deal, like they were friends and it was natural for Ushijima to anticipate his needs.

Tooru crinkled his nose in disgust but took the water bottle anyway. “Thanks,” he muttered.

Ushijima sat beside him without any more words between them. Tooru looked at him out of the corner of his eye while he took a drink. Ushijima appeared entirely unmoved by the heat save for a sheen of sweat on his forehead and neck and the way his t-shirt stuck to his chest.

Had he been working out more? It looked like he’d gained more definition than he’d had when they began playing together in April. Tooru wasn’t sure where Ushijima would’ve found the time to visit the weight room; it seemed as though he’d spent every free moment in Tooru’s unwilling company.

“It’s very warm today,” Ushijima said.

“Mm,” Tooru returned.

“Almost unseasonable,” Ushijima continued. “Generally it is not this warm until August.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I believe the Southern Oscillation is currently in an El Niño phase. Perhaps this is affecting the summer weather patterns.”

Tooru slowly lowered the water bottle. “You don’t say,” he said.

Ushijima turned toward him slightly. “Do you agree?”

“Agree?”

“Do you agree that the unseasonable heat could possibly be due to the ongoing climate event of the southern Pacific?” His sharp eyes demanded an answer.

“Do I _what_?”

“Ushijima!” called a voice to their left, and he looked up in response. One of their team members was walking toward them—Iseya, Tooru’s brain supplied, _middle blocker, good jump, weak hit, needs to improve his run-up_. “Coach wants to speak with you!”

Ushijima turned back toward Tooru. “I will speak with you later, Oikawa,” he said.

“I know you will,” Tooru sighed.

Ushijima climbed to his feet and strode off around the building. Tooru watched him go until he disappeared from sight. Then he realized Iseya was still standing next to where he sat, and he took a long drink to hide his odd sense of uneasiness.

“Ushijima’s a weird guy, right?” Iseya said.

Tooru didn’t look up. “Is he?” he offered innocently.

“You can see why he was so highly rated in high school,” Iseya said.

 _Better than you, Mr. Hesitant-With-His-Follow-Through_ , Tooru thought to himself. Out loud, he said, “he is talented,” in a conciliatory tone.

Iseya shifted his feet. Tooru suddenly realized that the boy was nervous. He glanced up and saw the anxiety playing on Iseya’s face.

_What the hell?_

Iseya rubbed his neck. “Listen…”

Tooru tensed.

“Maybe it’s… maybe it’s not my place to say.”

That was it, Tooru realized. Ushijima hadn’t noticed Tooru’s machinations, but it appeared that Iseya had. “What is it?” Tooru asked, keeping his voice purposefully light.

“It’s just…” Iseya looked away from Tooru, out over the school grounds. The gym was across from the soccer fields, where that club was currently running laps in the heat. “Look, he’s weird, but… I don’t think he’s a bad guy.”

Tooru fought the impulse to roll his eyes. Iseya didn’t know what it felt like. He didn’t know how it had been to constantly run into that brick wall in high school and have all his hard work dismissed without thought. “You don’t think so, huh?” he said.

“Yeah, so. I mean.” Iseya shrugged. “Oikawa, I’m not judging, okay? I don’t have a problem with guys who…” He drifted off. “So,” he tried again. “This isn’t about that, alright? I just don’t think that, I think you shouldn’t, you know, with Ushijima—”

“Will you just spit it out?!” Tooru demanded, when his irritation and discomfort got the better of him.

Iseya frowned at him. Tooru’s outburst seemed to give him the focus he needed. “I think you should stop jerking Ushijima around,” he said tightly.

There it was. “I’m not doing anything,” Tooru lied.

“Maybe it’s not obvious to people who aren’t looking for it,” Iseya said, “but you’re not being very subtle.”

“What is it that you think I’m doing?” Tooru said. He felt the plastic of the water bottle creak under his tightening grip.

“You’re taking advantage of Ushijima’s feelings, and you should stop.”

Tooru wanted to shout in frustration. “His… feelings.” Did Ushijima even have feelings?

“Stop pretending to be stupid,” Iseya ordered. “You’re the most perceptive guy on the team. You know full well how much Ushijima likes you.”

Tooru felt his mind screech to a halt. A bird chattered a few feet away. A squirrel meandered next to a nearby tree. Ushijima liked him.

“What,” Tooru said. “What.”

Suddenly, as though beckoned by the discussion, Ushijima reappeared around the side of the building.

Tooru looked at his face, the one bearing the same dull expression that he always wore, the one that had always appeared as a half-scowl before. Now he abruptly noticed the slight lift of Ushijima’s eyebrows when he spied Tooru looking.

“What?!” Tooru blurted.

Iseya kicked a rock. “I said what I wanted to. I’ll see you at practice.” He nodded at Ushijima as he approached, then left the two of them together.

“Oikawa,” Ushijima greeted. “Are you comfortable in this location?”

 _“What_ ,” Tooru hissed under his breath. It had to be some kind of joke. Some kind of prank. Maybe Ushijima was finally trying to get back at him.

Ushijima looked back at him with an entirely placid expression. “Would you like more water?” he asked.

Tooru stared. “N-no,” he said finally. “I’m fine.” He stood up. “Actually, I don’t feel well. I’m going back to my dorm.”

“Shall I walk with you?”

“No!” Tooru shouted. “No, just... Just tell the coaches for me, alright?”

Ushijima looked as though he wasn’t happy with that suggestion. _Fuck_ , Tooru thought. Since when was he able to read emotional nuance into Ushijima’s expression?

“If that’s what you want,” Ushijima said finally.

Tooru nodded. He was afraid to say anything else, afraid he might give himself away. He left Ushijima standing there beside the gym without another word.

As he walked, he felt angry tears winking into his eyes. Nausea swam in his gut. It couldn’t be real, right? Iseya was mistaken. He _had_ to be. There was no way, absolutely no way it was true. It was a spiker-setter thing, a you’re-the-only-person-on-the-team-I-know-from-before thing—anything but an I-like-you thing. God, it couldn’t be an I-like-you thing. Could it?

The thought of Ushijima liking him was ridiculous. Offensive, almost. _How_ could Ushijima like him? Tooru had been an absolute dick to him on purpose, barring the short period of time when he was nice in order to plot Ushijima’s downfall. Who would like the kind of person Tooru presented to Ushijima?

And in the unlikely event that Ushijima did harbor tender feelings for him, how could Ushijima think those feelings would ever be reciprocated?

This time, Tooru didn’t call Iwaizumi on the way home. That was what he did at times like these, but he didn’t know where to start, or how to get the words past his throat. What reason could a third party like Iseya have to lie?

He tried to put it from his mind when he closed the door of his room behind him. The Ushijima thing was an imagined problem, a misunderstanding; Ushijima hadn’t confirmed it. Then again, Ushijima hadn’t heard. Tooru opened his laptop, pulled up an assignment due in two days, and stared at it blankly for a long moment. Minutes, maybe. The words made no sense to him.

He closed the laptop and let his head drop into his hands. _You can’t not think about this_ , he admitted to himself, finally allowing himself to groan, to ball his fists, to tear at his hair. He picked up his phone and held it, inert. He didn’t intend to call anyone, but the weight of his phone was comforting in his hands. This phone had been with him constantly the last two years of high school; he hadn’t imagined any of the things that had happened back then. The phone was Seijou turquoise. It contained a LINE conversation with Makki and Mattsun and Iwaizumi that consisted mostly of puns and movie reviews. He looked through the old pictures and conversations on his phone, letting them ground him.

This phone was who he was. He wasn’t—

There was a knock at the door.

Tooru hoped he was paranoid. He hoped the knock was from a neighbor who’d heard the groaning and wanted to make sure he was all right, but given the timing, Tooru had his doubts. He opened the door feeling drained of everything, but found—upon seeing Ushijima’s face—that he could still somehow reexperience the shock of Iseya’s words, even when he felt empty of everything else.

“Ushiwaka-chan,” he said. His voice sounded weird to his own ears—panicky, maybe. “What do you want?”

“Your bag,” Ushijima said, handing the bag to Tooru. “Also, I brought food. To help you feel better.”

Ushijima set his own gym bag down, about to unzip it, and Tooru found himself unable to pretend any of this was normal.

“Why?” he asked. That panicky note was still there in his voice, making him sound breathy. “Why do you do all these things for me?”

Ushijima straightened. “Iseya said he was trying to help me. Why? What did he say to you?”

It was the first time Ushijima had failed to answer a question—the first time he looked rattled by anything—and Tooru couldn’t even bring himself to feel joy at having discomfited Ushijima in some way. He felt sick.

“He said you liked me,” he said, not dressing it up. For a moment there was no response, and Tooru began to relax—but then Ushijima nodded slowly.

“I realized last year that I thought about you more than I could explain,” Ushijima said. “It went beyond an appreciation of your skills, or frustration that you were my opponent instead of my teammate. I admire your mind, your determination, your skill. Simply put, I love you.”

Tooru felt cold, shocked, horrified. “But I don’t even _like_ you,” he said, unthinking—forgetting, until he saw the surprise on Ushijima’s face, that his words had the potential to cause harm.

Guilt followed shock. That look of surprise—he didn’t imagine it. There was something off about the bland expression that followed.

“Oh,” said Ushijima.

 _Oh_ , thought Tooru, thinking of all the practices to come.

“I will leave you be,” Ushijima said, picking up his bag. “Unless you do want something to eat?”

Tooru wanted to bang his head into the doorframe. “No,” he said, voice tight, wondering who he hated just now—himself or Ushijima.

Ushijima nodded and left. Tooru closed the door.

He managed to make it to the bed before falling on his face. It wasn’t even eight o’clock, but all he wanted to do was try to sleep. Maybe when he woke up in the morning, he would find that the current day had never happened. He could open his eyes and re-do the whole thing, and there would be no weird climatological conversation, no confrontation with Iseya, no confession in his dorm room and—

And Ushijima wouldn’t make that face. A year earlier, Tooru wouldn’t even have noticed the difference. But he’d spent the better part of the last two months scrutinizing every inch of Ushijima’s expression, looking for cracks in the mask, chinks in the armor. He’d come to know well every nuance of Ushijima’s expression, and he’d seen it in that moment: the hesitation, the hairline fracture in Ushijima’s usually unwavering composure.

He’d done it, Tooru realized. He’d cracked the code. He’d figured out how to make Ushijima miserable.

“I win,” he said into the suffocating quiet of his empty room. “I finally beat him.”

It was kind of funny, though. He didn’t feel the least bit victorious.

 

His roommate came in about an hour later, but Tooru had drawn the blinds and turned off the light. As Tooru pretended to be asleep, he listened to his roommate move carefully in the darkened room. That was so nice, so considerate, he thought to himself. Maybe his roommate was in love with him too.

Hysterical laughter caught in his throat and threatened to escape. Tooru shoved his face into his pillow and breathed hotly into the compact pocket his mouth made against the fabric until the feeling subsided.

He felt paralyzed and feverish. The thought of going to class tomorrow seemed impossible. The thought of practice after—Tooru felt nausea swim up inside him again. What would happen now? Would Ushijima quit?

Eventually, he must have fallen asleep, though his dreams were filled with anxious imaginings— people standing behind doors he needed to pass through, being watched, gravity no longer working. When he woke early in the morning for practice he was half glad to be awake, though it was Saturday, and that meant more time in practice than usual.

He was so, so tempted not to go—but he wouldn’t quit. If he’d wanted to quit, he should have done it back when he first saw Ushijima was on his team.

Later, when he dragged himself to the cafeteria, Ushijima wasn’t waiting for him outside, and he took the chance to sit with other teammates. Two of the second years had always reminded him of Makki and Mattsun, and they seemed happy when he joined them. He tried to be charming, but he kept his head down so he wouldn’t see when Ushijima entered.

 _You have to apologize_ , he thought as he picked at his breakfast. He couldn’t simply walk away and pretend there was no error on his side. If he apologized, he could feel normal again.

The opportunity didn’t present itself. Ushijima didn’t skip practice, but there was always a crowd when Tooru might have talked to him. Amazingly, now that Tooru was trying to talk to Ushijima alone, it was impossible to find the time—as if Ushijima had shrunk down his presence in Tooru’s life to what Tooru had longed for in the early days: just a spiker, just a teammate, not a particular friend.

Ushijima still said hello, stoic and bland, and Tooru wondered if his return greeting sounded at all like it had bubbled up from the acid in his stomach. At the end of the day, there was a goodbye—but again, in the presence of a crowd, and Tooru couldn’t get away. On Sunday, there was no practice. Tooru got work done, trying to escape from his guilty thoughts, but by afternoon he’d pulled out his phone to call Iwaizumi, desperate to absolve himself somehow. His roommate was out with friends, and Tooru lay on his bed waiting for Iwaizumi to pick up, the open window puffing a breeze now and then. Birds chirped incessantly.

“What have you done now?” Iwaizumi asked once he picked up, not bothering with a greeting. “Dye in his shampoo? Moved all the furniture in his room ten centimeters so he keeps banging his shin on stuff?”

Tooru laughed. He wished he was still pulling pranks; it’d be nice to go back to that time.

“I messed up,” Tooru said, and—haltingly—told Iwaizumi about the day before yesterday: Iseya’s accusation, Ushijima’s confession, his own stupid, shocked response.

“Wow,” Iwaizumi said at the end. “That’s… unbelievable, really.”

“I know. Can you believe my luck? Of all the people who could fall for me, it has to be the guy I’m nursing a lifelong grudge against.”

“What are you going to do?” Iwaizumi asked. The lack of censure helped Tooru feel like he wasn’t the worst person in the world. He’d made a mistake; that was all.

“Apologize. Tomorrow. I didn’t get the chance yesterday.”

Iwaizumi cleared his throat.

“What?”

“Have you thought of how you’ll get him alone?”

Tooru executed a laying-down shrug, looking at the ceiling. “I’ll manage somehow.”

Another clearing of Iwaizumi’s throat, then: “Maybe you haven’t considered this, but he might be avoiding you.”

Tooru groaned.

“Sorry,” Iwaizumi said. “I’m guessing you don’t want anyone from the team to know about this.”

“No. I feel awful about it. Imagine that: me, feeling sorry for Ushijima.”

“You know, I expected you to be at least a little flattered by this. You’re not taking it as a compliment? Where’s the ‘I can’t blame him, I’m fantastic’ Oikawa we know and barely tolerate?”

Tooru made himself smile, but it felt weird on his face, like the muscles were pulling in odd directions, all mismatched with his intentions. He closed his eyes. “Hajime,” he said, barely above a whisper, “am I a bad person?”

There was a long moment before Iwaizumi answered. “No…” he said hesitantly.

“What’s with that pause?!”

“You did spend two months trying to torture the guy,” Iwaizumi said.

“It’s not my fault,” Tooru insisted. “I was provoked.”

“I’m not sure physical proximity counts as provocation.”

Tooru covered his face with his free hand. “I _am_ a bad person.”

“You’re an okay person.”

“Iwa-chan.”

“It does explain a lot, doesn’t it?” Iwaizumi said.

Tooru made a noncommittal noise in reply.

“He bought you dinner, right?”

“At least a dozen times.”

“A _dozen_?” He sounded surprised.

“Oh, yeah, did I not mention them all?” Tooru asked hesitantly.

“A dozen times…” Iwaizumi repeated.

“That’s a lot, I guess.”

“You guess,” Iwaizumi scoffed. “And you never returned the favor? I take it back, you are a bad person.”

“Iwa-chan!”

“A man buys you dinner a dozen times and you’re surprised by a love confession.”

“This isn’t some movie, Iwa-chan!” Tooru insisted.

“You’re right, it’s not.” Iwaizumi’s voice was losing the placating tone and regaining his usual brusqueness. “He’s a real person with real feelings, as much as I hate to admit it.”

Tooru gave a theatrical sigh. “I don’t understand why he thought I’d like him back,” he said.

“I guess it doesn’t matter now.”

“I mean, it’s not my fault, right? I didn’t lead him on. I never made any indication that I was interested in him.”

“It’s Ushijima,” Iwaizumi said. “Who knows what goes on in his brain?”

Tooru rubbed between his eyebrows with his fingertips. He was getting the worst sort of headache behind his left eye. “I have to apologize,” he said again. “I need to just let it go and move on.”

“That sounds awfully mature to be coming from you.”

“This experience has aged me,” Tooru sighed.

“Oh? Are there lines in your aged brow?”

“Ha! You wish. I’m always going to be this good-looking.”

Iwaizumi laughed. “I guess you’re feeling better. So, your plan…”

Tooru sighed again. “Walk up to Ushiwaka, like a fool, and say the kind of thing he’d say like ‘can I speak to you in private?’ or something. Then… sorry. For not considering his feelings.”

“That’s good. Still sucks for him, but I can’t exactly say I hate the thought of him suffering a little.”

Tooru doubted Iwaizumi would feel that way if he’d seen Ushijima after Tooru’s thoughtless statement—or maybe it just sucked for Tooru because he’d been the one in the wrong, making an okay guy suffer. Whatever had passed between them in high school, a rejection like that was uncalled for.

“Can you believe I’m not even enjoying it? I hate this. Okay, Iwa-chan. Thanks for listening. You’re an okay person too.”

“I helped a grandmother cross the street today,” Iwaizumi said.

“Shut up, no you didn’t. Bye!”

Tooru felt better. He had a plan of attack, and Iwaizumi liked him regardless of whether he was a good person or a bad one, seemingly. He could always crawl back to Miyagi in shame someday if he had to. His stomach still tied itself in knots at the thought of tomorrow—but that was to be expected.

  


The fateful day dawned grey and damp, reminding Tooru uncomfortably of Ushijima’s statements about the odd summer weather. Did this fit into his El Niño phase thing theory? Or was this normal for June?

Tooru didn’t ask. When he asked Ushijima to speak to him, his mind was on one thing: getting the apology over with. After the Ushijima-like ‘can I speak to you in private?’, Tooru led Ushijima outside, under the awning of the cafeteria building. Part of him was grateful Ushijima hadn’t asked questions, but then, when did he?

When they were far enough from the entrance to be undisturbed, Tooru whirled. He put his hands in his pockets, then reconsidered and crossed his arms. He uncrossed them, aware of the posture crossed arms presented.

 _Just say it_.

“I’m sorry,” Tooru said. For the first time in days, he met Ushijima’s stare. “The other day, I was shocked, and I responded thoughtlessly. You didn’t deserve that. I hope this won’t get in the way of our playing.”

He nodded—more to himself than Ushijima, a short _yes, I think that was all I needed to say_ nod—and would have walked away if Ushijima hadn’t stopped him.

“But you meant it,” Ushijima said. “You don’t like me. May I ask—why?”

Tooru felt his mouth pinch involuntarily. He hadn’t expected that response. “I don’t know,” he lied. “Sometimes you just don’t click with people, you know?”

Ushijima frowned at his answer. It was almost imperceptible from his usual expression, but Tooru had unwittingly trained himself to see the difference. “Is it because we were opponents?” Ushijima asked. “Because Shiratorizawa was the superior team?”

Tooru’s sympathy for Ushijima’s position began to erode. Even now, he thought. Even now after all this time. “Shiratorizawa was not a superior team,” he returned sharply.

“We won every contest between—”

“Yeah, well, we beat Karasuno,” Tooru interrupted. “And Karasuno beat you.”

Ushijima closed his mouth. Tooru noted the way the corners of his lips tightened. Shiratorizawa’s loss at the Miyagi finals was still a sore spot after all, it seemed.

“Winning a game isn’t the only measure of a team’s level of skill,” Tooru said. It was something that he’d taken a long time to learn himself. But Ushijima didn’t have much experience with the idea, did he? He wasn’t as familiar with what it felt like to lose.

“I don’t understand,” Ushijima said. “Why does this bother you so much?”

“It’s easy for you,” Tooru said tightly. “You’ve always gotten everything you want. You haven’t felt what it’s like to struggle and fight and bleed just to stay on the court.”

Ushijima didn’t speak. Tooru continued. “My team was the best in Miyagi. I know it for a fact. I know it because I saw them every day, I saw them take hits that would knock anyone else off the map. I saw them fall down and get back up. I saw them lose and come back with the determination to never lose again. I saw them do it over and over.” He sneered at Ushijima. “And every single time you told me I made a mistake choosing them—” Tooru turned away. “Every single word out of your mouth was enough to guarantee we could never be friends, let alone something else.”

The silence that followed his tirade stretched long. When Tooru finally turned back to glance at Ushijima’s face, he found that Ushijima wasn’t looking at him. He was staring at the ground, one hand to his chin.

“So this is what you think of me,” Ushijima said finally.

“Am I wrong?” Tooru asked.

Ushijima lowered his hand. “I never understood your loyalty to Aoba Jousai,” he admitted. “They did not have the record to support your insistence of their superiority.”

Tooru bristled. His sympathy had all but evaporated. He wanted to leave. He didn’t want to look at Ushijima’s face anymore. “Great,” he bit acidly. “Anything else? I have to be somewhere,” he lied.

“Thank you for speaking with me,” Ushijima said. “I will consider what you said.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Tooru muttered. “No problem.” He turned on his heel and stalked away without saying goodbye. It would be a long time before his irritation faded enough that remorse began to squeeze back in around the edges of his consciousness.

  


In the week that followed, Tooru finally got a taste of college life as he’d first imagined it. Freed from Ushijima’s constant presence, he found more people talking to him, and the friendships he’d made in the first two months solidified. By all rights he ought to be ecstatic: he was popular, he had free time to go for food with people other than Ushijima, and he mostly saw Ushijima at practice and in the single class they shared. It was everything he’d wanted at the start of the year—and yet, despite the apology that ended in a renewal of his grudge against Ushijima, Tooru couldn’t quite enjoy his freedom.

Somehow—perhaps as divine punishment—Tooru found himself wondering what Ushijima would say about the things he saw and experienced. Every spate of changeable weather brought up the El Niño conversation in his mind. Every restaurant he wondered about made him think about online reviews, and predict whether Ushijima had read them. The times he made mental notes about his teammates in practice, he found himself wanting to discuss those notes with Ushijima; volleyball was the one topic they could talk about at length and with ease. They’d often agreed about the problems their team faced, though not always the solutions.

Until now, he hadn’t realized he’d come to rely on having Ushijima’s opinion ready to hand.

“Oikawa,” Ushijima said, exactly a week from the day Tooru apologized. He stood waiting outside the gym in the blazing sunshine, hands in his pockets. “A word?”

Tooru nodded, wordlessly following him to the shade of a large hedge by the gym’s entrance, away from prying eyes. He wondered if they were about to argue about Seijou again—until Ushijima turned to face him and executed a short but effective bow.

“I’m sorry,” Ushijima said. “My insistence that Shiratorizawa was the better fit for you caused you distress. It was foolish of me to think I knew you and your team better than you did.”

Tooru stared, and an electric charge zoomed down his spine when Ushijima’s eyes met his, totally unflinching. Did this guy have no shame? No self-awareness? He could at least look at the ground and shuffle his feet; this was an apology, but it felt like a challenge.

“I still believe that strength is strength. That won’t change. However, perhaps strength must be augmented by other qualities—qualities I don’t always consider in my evaluations, but which you are attuned to.”

It took a moment for Tooru to realize Ushijima was waiting for him to say something. “Uh,” was all he managed.

Ushijima nodded, as if that was enough. “I believe I must thank you for this opportunity to consider my biases. I must also thank you for your frankness. You may ignore the feelings I mentioned; I hope they will not affect our partnership.”

“Our partnership,” Tooru finally managed.

“Yes,” Ushijima said. “We are on the same team, and as such we must be able to interact on a professional level, at the very least.”

Tooru held the shoulder strap of his bag tightly in both hands, hoping it might provide some stability against the emotional whiplash of the conversation. “Is that enough for you?” he asked. He wasn’t sure why that was the question that came to him; it wouldn’t have mattered if Ushijima’s answer was no.

“My feelings are not your issue,” Ushijima said. “And they are not the team’s issue. It would be selfish and unreasonable if I made them so.”

Tooru wanted to get mad at how sensible his reply sounded. Instead, the guilt from the previous week came swimming up again, familiar and unwelcome. “Okay, Ushiwa-- Ushijima,” he said. “We can be... teammates.”

“Thank you,” Ushijima said. “I appreciate your graciousness and discretion on this matter.”

“Oh, sure,” Tooru returned awkwardly. “Anytime.” He’d been thanked three times in a single conversation by the man he’d rejected just a week earlier. He felt off-center and unable to answer with his usual level of frivolity.

“I’ll see you at practice,” Ushijima said. He turned to leave.

Tooru jumped to attention. “That’s it?” he said. “Just, back to usual now?”

Ushijima paused. Without turning back around, he said, “I think it would be best.” His voice was softer than Tooru ever remembered hearing it. He stepped away and disappeared around the end of the hedge.

“You really expect things to go back to normal after this,” Tooru said to empty air, disbelieving— too shocked to be amused.

To his great surprise, they almost did.

  


It wasn’t long before summer vacation brought a reprieve from constant classwork and volleyball. There would be a camp later on in the summer, at training grounds up in the mountains where the national team had spent a year while a new facility was being built. Their head coach Yamamura had promised the team an arduous week, where they’d be joined by alumni and extra staff—but that was later. Tooru went back to Miyagi with a sense of deep relief, like he’d finally be able to replenish his energy stores—or, more accurately, his sanity stores. He’d pay good money to have his life go back to what he considered normal.

Seeing his Seijou friends the first afternoon he was back was an oasis-like reprieve from the desert of his life, and he told them so as they settled into their booth at their old favorite restaurant. Since they all knew about the initial Ushijima feud—though not its abrupt conclusion—they laughed and whacked his back affectionately.

“It’s not too late for you guys to transfer to my school,” Tooru told them. “Not that I want to see you, or anything, but you know. Compared to Ushijima…”

Makki and Mattsun grinned. They were at the same university, playing together again. “Fat chance,” Makki said. “You’re on your own, Hanger-san.”

Tooru sighed at the old nickname.

“We’re the most attractive people on our team,” Mattsun added with a slow grin. “Not a joke. Don’t you dare transfer to join us. We never want you showing up at our school.”

“Did you just hint that I’m good-looking?” Tooru said. “‘Oikawa, people at our new school think we’re hot, please don’t disillusion them by letting them see you’?”

“Honestly?” Makki said. “Yes. No one ever noticed us with you around.”

“It’s the hair,” Mattsun said. He was looking up at Tooru’s hair appreciatively. “It’s so bouncy. Even a straight guy might find himself thinking ‘wow, I wonder what Oikawa’s hair feels like’.”

Tooru grinned and turned to Iwaizumi, wondering what he made of this string of compliments.

“Don’t look at me,” Iwaizumi said. “I’m not adding to that.”

“Only because we’ve said it all,” Mattsun said. His smile was seductive—and Tooru realized what was going on.

“You’re trying to make me pay for the food!” he said, horrified. The laughter that followed confirmed his accusation. It was official: his friends were awful human beings, taking advantage of his sentimental mood and his love of being complimented. He sniffed.

“I’ll pay, but only because I’m a good friend.” He looked at Iwaizumi and added, “And a good person.”

“The best,” Makki agreed, with Mattsun nodding. Even Iwaizumi was grinning.

“An okay person,” Iwaizumi said, and turned to the waitress to order.

  


Even at home, Tooru wasn’t free; that much was clear when he received a plea from one of the coaches to please pick up a folder from Ushijima’s house the second week of vacation.

 **Your teammate is traveling with his family, but he said his neighbor had a key to the house and would be able to let me in** , the email read. **I believe you live nearby. Could you go and take pictures of the relevant pages?**

There followed an address and a ‘thanks in advance’ that Tooru didn’t quite appreciate. Of all the things to do in his free time, why did he have to go to Ushijima’s house? But it _was_ nearby, and Ushijima wouldn’t be there, and—this was perhaps the relevant part—he was curious.

He put it off until the next day nonetheless, just to make his coach sweat a little. It was his own fault for losing his own folder so that Ushijima had the only copy remaining. Furthermore, what kind of person took volleyball rosters and team information back with them on summer vacation?

 _An Ushijima kind of person_ , Tooru answered himself on the way over, the wind whipping at his—bouncy, lustrous, Mattsun-approved—hair. He had plenty of time to contemplate Ushijima’s strangeness on the bicycle ride to his house. While close by car, Ushijima’s place was almost an hour away both by bike and public transport. Geographically near—but not well connected. And didn’t that just describe Ushijima to a T?

Tooru hummed as he cycled, his mood strangely buoyant. He had no idea why he was so willing to snoop on Ushijima’s private life, but perhaps it harkened back to the time when he’d been looking for weaknesses. What if he found Ushijima’s porn stash? He laughed at the thought of telling Ushijima he’d found his dirty magazines, then sobered abruptly, remembering that Ushijima was into him. Did that mean he’d find gay porn? No, never mind—most people didn’t keep physical porn around these days; much easier to keep it on a computer.

Then again, Ushijima was fairly traditional…

He shook his head, trying to rid it of musings about Ushijima’s porn preferences. _That_ was a conversation they’d never have, regardless of what Tooru found at his house. He turned his mind to summer festivals and upcoming social events for the rest of the trip, wanting to be able to look Ushijima in the eye next time he saw him.

Gradually he noticed that the houses were becoming fewer and the lots between them growing bigger the further he traveled away from his home. Ushijima’s neighborhood was on the opposite side of a broad ridge. The houses in the area were small and old, almost suffocated by the surrounding trees covered in the heavy dark foliage of summer growth. The road went over a col in the ridge, which Tooru managed to puff over on his bike; thankfully there was no one around to watch him struggle through the last few meters of ascent as his bike trembled nearly to a stop before reaching the highest point of the road. From there he coasted down the hillside, enjoying the cool breeze on his sweaty face and the scent and sound of forest around him.

Ushijima’s house was at the end of a side-road which twisted deep into the forested hillside. The property was surrounded by a tall wall with a wrought iron gate, which bore the characters of his surname on the nameplate. A second, much newer nameplate sat below Ushijima’s, bearing an entirely different name. Tooru frowned at the paper in his hand. Did two families live on the property?

Ushijima’s neighbor looked him over curiously when he knocked on her door.

“Hello,” he said. “I’m Oikawa Tooru, a teammate of Ushijima’s. The coach needed me to pick something up from his house. Can you help?”

The neighbor was an elderly woman. She was dressed for the outdoors and wore a head cover, and Tooru had the distinct impression he had interrupted her while gardening. She led him to the Ushijima property all the same, and unlocked the gate. When he asked about the front door, she just waved her hand. “It’s never locked,” she said, before she turned back toward her own house. Tooru stepped through the gate and pulled it closed behind him, then took in what he could see.

The property was more grounds than house. Tooru could see a large garden curling around the side of the house into the hidden area behind it. Inside the wall, the trees were less dense but still prevalent, and as Tooru walked forward he passed in and out of dappled sunlight. He spied a tree-swing made of rope and board a little ways off the right side of the house; the rustic simplicity of it made the scene seem like something from a book. The house itself wasn’t very large, only two full stories with what looked like an attic above. It appeared to be rather old, as it was covered in peeling paint and had a broken window on the highest level which was patched with masking tape.

Tooru felt strangely unnerved by the sight of it. He wasn’t sure what he had imagined when he thought about where Ushijima lived, but he was fairly certain a run-down old house in the middle of nowhere wasn’t what he would have pictured.

He went up the steps onto the front porch. He hesitated at the door for only a moment before reaching out for the handle. The door creaked as he entered. The household was quiet beyond, just as the yard had been. Tooru stepped over the threshold carefully. “Hello?” he called softly. He hung back in the foyer, rocking back and forth from his toes to his heels as he contemplated his course of action.

Something rustled to his left and he turned quickly, his heart pounding. He realized it was a breeze from the open door passing through the pile of mail on an end table beside him. Tooru rolled his eyes at himself. “It’s not a horror movie, you idiot,” he groused out loud. He squashed down his uncertainty, kicked off his shoes, and entered the main part of the house.

Though small and just as old as the outside, the house’s interior was well-maintained. There was no dust lurking in corners, the air smelled of a floral detergent Tooru recognised from Ushijima’s own clothes, and the pictures on the walls were in shiny frames and looked up to date. In fact…

Tooru ambled over, hands in the pockets of his capris. One of the most prominent pictures was of Ushijima and—a baby? Tooru goggled, taking a long moment to process the image. Ushijima seemed to be holding the child properly, but there was something about his stone-faced expression that seemed totally inappropriate for the occasion. It was comical, really, and Tooru nearly snapped a picture to show Iwaizumi—but perhaps that was too much of an invasion of privacy. He turned to the other pictures, wondering about the family dynamics. There was a man in some of the newer pictures—obviously connected to Ushijima’s mother—who didn’t resemble Ushijima in the least. His stepfather? His grandparents featured a lot, too.

Had Ushijima’s dad died? But even a dead dad would merit a picture, surely. Tooru found himself walking around the house, looking for clues in the rest of the pictures, right until—

“Oikawa?”

Tooru jumped several feet, and he was pretty sure he screamed, too. He whirled to face Ushijima, his heart racing. “Ushiwa—what are you _doing_ here?!”

Very slowly, Ushijima raised a hand to indicate the pictures on the wall. Tooru let out a slow breath, one hand over his heart.

“Yes, I know it’s your house! But you’re not meant to be here—Coach told me to come over to take pictures of that folder because you couldn’t—”

“Ah,” said Ushijima. “He didn’t say. I came back early so I could send the relevant documents to him. I didn’t want our team to suffer.”

They regarded each other. The email had stated the folder was on Ushijima’s desk upstairs, and Tooru was in the living room investigating Ushijima family history, clearly not looking for the folder. It had to look odd to Ushijima, given Tooru’s earlier hostility.

Tooru felt like a fool—a nosy fool.

“Were you an only child?” he asked, because there was no reason to pretend he hadn’t been spying.

Ushijima nodded. “For a long time. My sister was born two years ago.”

“Your half-sister?”

Ushijima looked at the floor then up, seeming to gather himself. “My sister.”

Tooru blinked. He hadn’t expected Ushijima to feel any particular way about a baby sister, but it was clear he was attached—even if they didn’t share a father. “Right.”

“Do you… want something to drink? Eat?”

After a moment’s hesitation, Tooru nodded. “Water is fine. I cycled over.”

He followed Ushijima to a small but bright kitchen, somewhat charmed by the fruit motif on the curtains. Tooru’s own house was sleek and sparse, totally unlike what he’d seen of Ushijima’s home so far, but while he prefered modern designs, he thought they wouldn’t suit Ushijima; he’d just look more robot-like in them. A Western-style table with four chairs took up the corner of the kitchen under the window which looked out onto the garden. The table had a potted plant in the center and four place mats which matched the curtains. Against the wall was a tall chair with a velcro baby harness attached.

Tooru stood to the side of the kitchen while Ushijima opened the fridge. “My family is still on vacation, so there is not much to eat at the moment,” Ushijima said as he peered inside.

Tooru shook his head. “Just water is fine.” _The sooner, the better_ , he added silently.

“You should replenish sugar and salt,” Ushijima said. “Bicycling in the heat is strenuous work.”

The recommendation felt familiar, harkening back to the early days of the semester when Ushijima was trying to make him eat properly. He’d had the time to reflect on Ushijima’s behavior in the time since his confession and occasionally felt retrospective mortification at how obvious Ushijima’s affections had been, and how dense he’d been in return.

“That’s fine,” Tooru said. “I should be going anyway.”

“No, please stay,” Ushijima said as he closed the fridge after extracting two bottles of water. Tooru blinked. It was the first time Ushijima had ever failed to capitulate immediately to one of his demands.

“I really should—”

“I believe you owe me one pleasant visit,” Ushijima cut in. “After all the dinners I paid for.”

Tooru felt his mouth drop open. Ushijima grabbed two oranges out of a bowl on the counter and gestured for Tooru to sit at the table. Tooru was too dumbfounded to argue and slumped down in one of the chairs like a sack of potatoes.

Ushijima set a bottle of water and an orange in front of Tooru’s place and sat across from him. When Tooru glanced up, he realized that Ushijima bore an expression that could be described as almost puckish. .

“Ushijima Wakatoshi,” Tooru said in disbelief.

“That is my name.”

“Are you actually _teasing_ me?”

“I do not believe such a thing is in my nature,” Ushijima said as he began to peel into his orange, but Tooru knew he hadn’t imagined the look. It seemed the taciturn giant had some semblance of a sense of humor after all.

Tooru opened his water and took a long, grateful drink of it. He was thirstier than he realized. He finally lowered the bottle with a satisfied gasp. “Oh man,” he said. “Thanks.”

“Of course.”

He put down the water and picked up the orange. Tooru wasn’t tremendously interested in eating it, so he just rolled the fruit around in his hands, letting it fall from palm to palm. “So. You have a baby sister,” he said.

“Yes. She is twenty-seven months old.”

“How many days and seconds?” Tooru asked.

“That level of specificity in her age is not required.”

Tooru bit back a laugh and waved his hand. “Sorry, sorry. So twenty-seven, hm?” He did a quick mental calculation. “That means her birthday was in April?”

“Yes.”

Tooru imagined Ushijima holding a tiny newborn in a park full of cherry blossoms. “I see,” he said as he tried to keep his amusement under wraps.

“It… was not planned. My mother remarried when she found she was expecting,” Ushijima said.

Tooru put the orange down. The admission seemed intensely personal, and he felt his interest spike. “Is that why there are two names next to your gate?”

“Yes,” Ushijima said. “Inomoto is my stepfather’s name.”

Tooru nodded. “You didn’t change yours?” They were both still under twenty.

“No,” Ushijima said. His hands stilled on his orange. “Ushijima is my grandparents’ name,” he said quietly. “I did not wish to change it.”

Tooru leaned forward. “Are you close with them?”

“I didn’t used to be,” Ushijima said. “My mother’s family is very traditional. When she and my father divorced, they did not approve. We had to leave the family plot and move to this house.”

Tooru remembered the elderly people in the photos. They didn’t look as though they weren’t pleased to be there. “But something changed, then?”

Ushijima nodded. “My grandfather fell ill, and Grandmother decided to break with the family. She chose to move in with us here.”

It didn’t seem like a very big house for four adults and two children. Tooru asked, “You all live here together now?”

Ushijima shook his head. “Grandfather passed away eight years ago,” he said.

Tooru sat back. After a pause, he picked the orange back up again. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know.”

“There is nothing to be sorry about,” Ushijima said matter-of-factly. “I wouldn’t have expected you to know.” He began peeling his orange again. He was nearly finished. The pithy interior seemed small in his enormous hands.

Eight years. Ushijima would’ve been ten years old. “It must’ve been hard for you,” Tooru said.

Ushijima peeled away the last portion of rind. “It was a long time ago,” he said.

Tooru sighed. He put his elbow on the table so he could rest his chin in his palm. In the other hand, he rolled his orange down over his fingers, then flicked his wrist at the last minute so the orange spun smoothly up onto the back of his hand. “So now it’s you, your sister, your grandma, and your mom and stepdad?”

Ushijima nodded. “Mother met Inomoto-san four years ago,” he said.

Tooru dropped the orange. “You call your stepdad ‘Inomoto-san’?”

“What else would I call him?”

“Nothing, never mind. Not sure why I asked,” Tooru said.

Ushijima held out the peeled orange toward him. After a moment, when he realized that Ushijima was handing it to him, Tooru took it. Ushijima reached across the table—his arms were so long it was barely a stretch for him—and plucked the dropped orange from in front of Tooru. Then he began to peel that one.

Tooru stared at the segmented interior in his hand. A lovely citrus smell filled the small kitchen. “You’re feeding me again,” he said.

“A bad habit, it seems,” Ushijima returned.

Tooru laughed; he couldn’t help it. It seemed weird to be genuinely laughing in Ushijima’s kitchen, but it had been a weird summer so far, and he didn’t see a reason that should change. He bit into the orange without even bothering to separate the segments. Juice ran down his chin.

After that, they didn’t speak any more about Ushijima’s family. They spoke of volleyball and their team, how they could plan to get to a point of reliably playing in official matches. They spoke of their upcoming summer training camp, which would take place a few weeks before classes started up again late August.

Tooru hadn’t realized how long they’d spent together in the kitchen until he saw the dappled light had turned golden in the kitchen window. “I should go,” he said, “before it gets dark.”

Ushijima didn’t argue this time. He walked with Tooru out to the foyer, and watched politely as Tooru slipped into his shoes.

Tooru put his hand on the door. “Thanks for the snack,” he said. “And for the…” He shrugged. “Well, whatever it was.”

Ushijima nodded but didn’t otherwise respond. Tooru took that as all the goodbye he’d receive. He opened the door.

“Oikawa,” Ushijima said.

Tooru turned, halfway onto the porch.

“Would you like to meet them?” Ushijima asked.

“What?”

“My family,” he explained.

Tooru didn’t know what to say. “I…”

“They’ll return on Saturday,” Ushijima said. “I would appreciate if you could come for dinner on Sunday.”

Tooru could hear the birds in the trees outside; he knew his bike was just on the other side of the gate, that freedom was not far off. He knew he’d get his fill of Ushijima when classes started again, that he’d been planning to enjoy his summer as an escape. But the expression on Ushijima’s face—the raised eyebrows, the mild set of his mouth… Tooru still remembered how that face had looked when he rejected him. He found his answer coming up like vomit before he was able to rationalize away from it.

“Okay,” Tooru said. “I’ll come on Sunday.”

Ushijima nodded, and Tooru didn’t know what part of his expression indicated his satisfaction—he didn’t smile—but he could read that Ushijima was happy nonetheless. Tooru whirled and walked across the yard toward his bike, jumping onto it and zooming off at the first opportunity, not looking back.

“What the _fuck_?” he asked himself when he was a good distance away. Dinner with Ushijima’s family? Why?

And why hadn’t he been able to think of an excuse on time?


	2. Chapter 2

“Iwa-chan, I’m sick,” Tooru whined on Sunday. He lay sprawled on the living room couch, watching the time tick down to when he needed to leave. Iwaizumi had been thoroughly informed of the situation.

“Think of how bad you’ll feel if you skip,” Iwaizumi suggested, and Tooru did as he was told. He groaned.

“Now I just feel worse.”

“It’ll be fine. He _is_ your teammate. Maybe you can start sorting out which of you will be captain in your third and fourth year.”

“Four years,” Tooru echoed. Four years in Ushijima’s frequent company. There was a lot to be said for befriending him—but dinner with his family?

Iwaizumi patted his shoulder in a rare show of sympathy.

“I thought you hated him too,” Tooru mumbled, turning onto his side.

“No. Yes. High school… already feels like a long time ago. He’s odd, but you said he apologized for antagonizing you so much.”

“Mm. He did.”

“Plus, if I was keeping score, I’d say you got back at him eventually.”

Tooru sighed. What an empty victory that had been.

“Want to hear something sappy?”

Tooru looked up, catching Iwaizumi’s gaze. He waited.

“I think this might be making you into a nicer person. I’m kind of proud.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope. Totally serious. Don’t get _too_ nice though, okay?”

Tooru laughed. “Like I could.”

Iwaizumi grinned. “Okay, Cinderella. Isn’t it time to get ready?”

“‘Get ready’? What? Am I putting on makeup?”

Iwaizumi stood up. He picked something up from the coffee table and held it out for Tooru to read. It was a women’s magazine, his mother’s or sister’s, and Iwaizumi was pointing to an article heading that said ‘5 ways to wow him’. Iwaizumi raised an eyebrow.

“Hmm?” he said suggestively, and Tooru aimed a punch at his stomach. Iwaizumi dodged, laughing unrepentantly. He was enjoying this! This _ass_ —

“I’m going to kill you!” Tooru raged.

“Then who would you complain to?”

Tooru got up, wanting to at least pinch Iwaizumi into submission—and realized that might have been the whole point. He was up, now, no longer languishing on the couch. Iwaizumi pushed him towards the stairs.

“Go change. I’m leaving.”

Tooru tried not to feel abandoned. “Can’t you come with me?”

“Nope. There’s a game console calling my name.”

Tooru let himself be pushed, and he called a goodbye when Iwaizumi left. He did change, though only because his shirt had gotten a stain on it in the course of the day. He washed his face too, even though it’d get sweaty again during the ride over. He stood at the sink, looking at his reflection

“This is a one time thing,” he told that reluctant face. “It’ll be over before I know it.”

Soon he was off, cycling towards Ushijima’s house again. The sky was gold, the air still; he had to pedal hard to earn a breeze. Perhaps due to his trepidation, the journey passed quickly, and before he was prepared he was stepping off his bike and walking through the unlocked gate. He walked up to the door with his heart in his throat and knocked.

 _Shit, shit, shit_. What if they all knew how badly he’d treated their treasured son? A protective mother probably didn’t care much for a ‘but I was taking revenge for how mean he was to me’ response.

He was relieved when Ushijima opened the door, though that relief melted slightly when no greeting was forthcoming. Could it be that Ushijima hadn’t expected him to come? Was that look surprise?

“Invite me in,” Tooru said, finally looking away.

“Oikawa,” Ushijima said, stepping aside. “Thank you for coming.”

Tooru opened his mouth to respond, but at that moment two small blurs of white fur darted around Ushijima’s legs and attacked Tooru’s bare calves in a flurry of tickling hair, snorting hot breath, and wet noses.

Tooru did _not_ scream in a high-pitched tone, though he was certainly tempted to. Instead he spent a hot minute hopping from foot to foot while holding his satchel above his head as he tried to ascertain exactly what was accosting him.

“These are my grandmother’s dogs,” Ushijima said. “Sugar and Salt.”

“ _What_ ?” Dogs, dogs. Ushijima and dogs—it sounded vaguely familiar to Tooru. Abruptly he remembered their conversation in the restaurant on their first dinner together. “Wait a minute, _these_ are the dogs you were talking about?!” They didn’t even reach Tooru’s knees.

“Yes.”

The small dogs snuffling around Tooru’s calves seemed to decide he was not as interesting as initially expected and went back to Ushijima. One nipped and growled at the cuff of his sock, the other braced its front paws on his leg and began to bark.

“Sugar. Salt.” Ushijima’s tone was firm and loud. “Sit.” The two dogs sat back obediently. They were nearly identical; both had shiny black eyes and little black noses in their round white faces. They panted with excitement, gaping mouths appearing to smile as they stared up at Ushijima.

“Inside,” Ushijima said in the same tone, and the dogs tripped over each other in their spirited attempts to obey his command. Tooru heard their claws scrabbling over the hard flooring of the foyer as they disappeared.

“Would you like to come in?” Ushijima asked, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

Tooru stepped inside, remembering despite his bewilderment to grab his gift from his satchel before putting it down. “Here,” he said.

“A cactus,” Ushijima said. “Should I assume there’s a hidden meaning?”

Tooru took off his shoes. “Yeah. It reminded me of your face.”

Ushijima’s tiny exhale sounded a lot like laughter. Tooru stood up and pointed at two dark nubs on the small, round cactus.

“Here, it’s about to bloom. Don’t overwater it.”

They walked through to the kitchen, and the gauntlet began. Ushijima introduced his family while Tooru tried not to let his ongoing crisis— _why am I here? why did I agree to this?—_ show on his face. Ushijima’s mother was an expressive woman, so active that she seemed nervous, whereas his grandmother was more sedate as she put the last touches on dinner and shooed them all over to the table. Ushijima’s stepdad was trying to wrestle Ushijima’s baby sister back into a shirt she’d half wriggled out of; she was giggling and resisting his attempts.

The dogs were everywhere underfoot, licking all exposed skin until a sharp rebuke from Ushijima’s grandmother sent them to sit in the corner in a pair of dog beds, identical save for the embroidered name of each dog.

“Thank you for inviting me,” Tooru said, not sitting down yet. His hesitation put him close to the child, which proved to be a bad move.

She stilled and stared at him, going from bursts of giggles to silent scrutiny in that unsettlingly fast way children sometimes did. Tooru looked back at her; the stepdad managed to get the shirt back on while she was distracted.

“Hello,” Tooru said.

“This is Akiko,” Ushijima said. “She speaks.”

That wasn’t apparent; she was still staring.

“Oikawa Tooru,” Ushijima said to Akiko, like she’d have the mental acuity to remember it.

Akiko had reddish-tinted hair. It seemed impossible, as everyone else at the table—save Ushijima’s grandmother—had dark hair, including his stepdad. Her eyes were deep brown, large and expressive as she stared hard at Tooru.

“Nice to meet you, Akiko-chan,” Tooru said in his sweetest voice.

She stuck a finger in her nose.

“Akiko-chan!” Ushijima’s mother exclaimed in a flustered tone.

Her husband laughed. “It’s all right!” he said. He gently took a hold of Akiko’s elbow and pulled her arm down. She didn’t seem to notice.

“How was your trip, Oikawa?” Ushijima asked.

Tooru whipped his head around to look at Ushijima across the table. Ushijima seemed not to notice the attention the toddler received at Tooru’s elbow. “It was fine,” Tooru said. “Just a little warm.”

“Inomoto-san can give you a ride home after dinner,” Ushijima said.

“Dear, perhaps you shouldn’t offer your father’s services without discussing with him first,” Ushijima’s mother said.

“Of course.” Ushijima turned. “Inomoto-san, will you drive Oikawa home this evening?”

Inomoto was trying to get a bib around Akiko’s neck. “Of course I can,” he said. “But you’ll need to come with me, Wakatoshi. I’d get lost otherwise.”

“It is decided,” Ushijima said.

“Wait,” Tooru cut in, “I don’t need a ride home. My bike is fine.”

Inomoto waved his hand. “It’s alright. These mountains can get a little strange after dark.”

Tooru sat back. The thought had occurred to him that this dinner could be a way to wipe his debts clean; he didn’t want any more favors in his ledger. “Thank you,” he said, though his stomach twisted.

He felt a touch on his arm and looked down. Akiko was leaning almost out of her chair, those dark eyes fixed on him. “Sof,” she said.

Tooru blinked. “Sof…” he repeated.

She reached up toward his hair. “Sof!” she said again.

“Akiko likes your hair,” Ushijima said suddenly.

“Oh!” Tooru laughed. His hair—maybe it was his best feature after all. After a moment of reminding himself he was trying to be nice to Ushijima, and stickiness could be washed off, he leaned down so she could reach.

Akiko patted the side of his head. “Hm-mm,” she babbled thoughtfully. “Sof.”

“Be gentle, Akiko-chan,” Inomoto said. “No pulling.”

“She’s fine!” Tooru insisted. “My nephew was a nightmare at this age.”

“Then you have siblings, Oikawa-kun?” Ushijima’s mother asked.

“Just an older sister.”

“What does your family do?”

“Pincess!” Akiko interrupted, drawing attention back to herself.

“What was that, Akiko-chan?” Tooru said.

“I believe,” Ushijima said calmly, “that she called you a princess.”

A beat of silence followed the revelation. Ushijima’s mother covered her mouth with her hand. Inomoto bit his lip.

Tooru felt the laughter fill up his chest like soda bubbles. “Why, thank you, Akiko-chan!” he said. “I think you make a good princess too!”

Ushijima’s mother started giggling behind her hand. His stepdad grinned. “All right!” he said. “Are the princesses ready to eat? I’m starving. Mother, is the food ready?”

Ushijima’s grandmother called from the stove, “Wakatoshi, will you help me carry the dishes?”

Plate after plate came out to the table. _It reminds me of my grandmother’s cooking_ , Ushijima had said about the restaurant next to campus. Tooru was beginning to understand why.

Ushijima placed a serving spoon in Tooru’s hand. “Please serve yourself,” he said. “Your highness.”

“You joke, but I’ve been called by royal titles before, you know.” He started to serve others before himself; he wasn’t used to meals like this, but he knew how they were meant to go.

“Oh?”

It was hard not to grin. “The grand king,” Tooru said.

“The grand king!” said Ushijima’s stepdad. “What a title.”

“What did you do to earn it?” Ushijima’s mother asked, leaning forward.

Tooru smiled and shrugged, as if people bestowed grand titles on him every day. Perhaps they did. “Just volleyball,” he said airily.

Ushijima and his grandmother were done. They seated themselves, and Tooru served them too.

“Who?” Ushijima asked. Just that: _who_.

It was impossible to keep from grinning. “Chibi-chan. From Karasuno.”

If Tooru hadn’t been watching, he might have missed the way Ushijima’s expression hardened for a moment. Resentment? Or eagerness for a rematch? No way to know, unless he asked about it later.

“Karasuno,” Grandmother said, with a glance at her grandson. “Well, we’ll see how they do this year.”

“My nuisance underclassman is still on the team,” Tooru said. “They’ll be a pain, however far they get.”

He looked up suddenly, shocked—this was the way he talked to his friends, and to people like Ushijima whose opinions he didn’t care about. It wasn’t the way he talked to nice strangers offering him food—but when he looked around everyone seemed to be amused rather than offended. He caught Ushijima’s eye and couldn’t help but feel like a zoo animal, keenly observed, so he stopped talking entirely and dug in after a short thank-you-for-the-food.

He managed not to let his unsportsmanly side show too much for the remainder of the dinner, becoming unfailingly polite. The only person he teased was Akiko, who seemed to love the attention.

When dinner was finished, Ushijima stood and began to clear the dishes, but his mother grabbed his wrist and said, “Wakatoshi, dear, we’ll clean up. Why don’t you take your friend upstairs?”

Tooru shook his head. “No, that’s alright, I’m…” He fought for an excuse. He’d meant to leave right after dinner. No lie came to him. He couldn’t exactly explain why he felt uncomfortable going upstairs with Ushijima. _We’re not friends, actually, I kind of hate him but he was in love with me and I didn’t know, now we’re awkward acquaintances_ , didn’t really seem an appropriate conversation to have at his family’s dinner table.

Ushijima blinked at her for a moment, then slowly turned his gaze onto Tooru. “Oikawa,” he said.

Tooru felt his shoulders slowly lower. He sighed internally. “Lead the way,” he said. He tried to keep the defeat out of his voice.

On the first level of the house, Tooru had seen the kitchen and living room. At his previous visit, he’d seen fusuma panels along the back of the living room, but hadn’t had the desire or the time to snoop behind them.

Upstairs consisted of a hallway and four closed doors. Tooru silently counted in his head. Bedrooms: Ushijima, his mom and stepdad, the baby. Maybe his grandmother would have a bedroom downstairs? Ushijima went for the door on the left at the end of the hallway. He opened the door and stepped aside for Tooru to enter first.

Tooru stepped up to the door and realized it was a second staircase. _Attic_ , he thought. He’d forgotten there was an attic.

“Iwa-chan knows where I am,” Tooru said as he climbed the steep stairs ahead of Ushijima. “If you murder me you’ll be in trouble.”

“If I wanted to murder you I would have done it a long time ago.”

There was that odd sense of humor again. Tooru got to the top of the stairs and wandered into Ushijima’s attic room, which would be stifling if the windows had been shut. It smelled like the wood the walls were made out of, and there were no decorations. Tooru wondered if Ushijima had brought his personal belongings to school or if he never had any in the first place.

“How is he?” Ushijima asked.

“He?”

“Your ace. Iwa…” Ushijima gestured.

 _Trust him not to know his name_ , Tooru thought, with a flash of old annoyance. He shrugged. “He’s fine. Likes his new school. We’ve been to—”

He stopped, his eye catching on a flash of brass next to the window. “You’re kidding me,” he said.

“I haven’t said anything,” Ushijima said.

“No, nothing you said.” Tooru crossed the room toward the window quickly. Next to it in a tripod stand was an old brass telescope. Tooru crouched next to it to look at it more closely. “This is amazing!”

“Oh,” Ushijima said. “You like telescopes?”

“Do I like telescopes, he asks. Is this yours?”

Ushijima appeared at his elbow. “It was my grandfather’s,” he said.

Tooru touched the eyepiece of the telescope. It creaked a little as he moved it, and Ushijima’s hand appeared at the base of the tripod to steady it. Tooru met his eyes briefly, then dropped his hand. “Oh, sorry,” he said.

Ushijima slowly lowered his hand. “It is fragile,” he said.

Tooru felt a frown tug at his mouth. “Just for show, huh?” he said. He felt oddly disappointed. For a moment, he’d thought he’d finally found something besides volleyball to talk about with Ushijima.

Ushijima gave the telescope another steadying nudge. “Until I can get it restored,” he said.

The implication made Tooru perk up again. “So you used it before?”  
  
Ushijima nodded. “With my grandfather.”

It still felt weirdly intimate to talk about Ushijima’s relatives. Tooru realized they were crouching close together. He stood up quickly and cleared his throat. He began to meander about Ushijima’s room, peering at the few books in his bookcase—all for sports or school—and the handful of papers on his desk, including the damned folder that had started the whole thing. Tooru picked up the folder and began to flip through it.

“I suppose it was too much to expect you to be interested in astronomy,” Tooru said.

“I also utilized the telescope on my own after he died,” Ushijima said.

Tooru closed the folder with a snap. “Oh yeah? To do what? Scope out courts in the valley to practice in?”

Ushijima was still crouched on the floor next to the telescope. He looked unblinking at Tooru for a long moment. Finally, he said, “I know that I am uninteresting.”

Tooru felt the stab of guilt again. He set the folder back down. “That’s not what I meant.”

“It is true, though,” Ushijima said. He stood up. “It was the same in high school. Socializing does not come easily to me. I was never good at conversations with my classmates.” He looked at Tooru again. “It is a quality I envy in you, Oikawa.”

Tooru felt knocked back. He never imagined Ushijima might envy anything about him. “Yeah, well,” he started awkwardly. “There’s such a thing as being too popular.”

“Perhaps,” Ushijima agreed.

Silence stretched between them. Tooru cleared his throat again and gave another glance around Ushijima’s room. “The attic makes a pretty cool bedroom,” he said.

“It matters little to me,” Ushijima said. Tooru fought the impulse to roll his eyes. “Although…” Ushijima inclined his head slightly. “It does get somewhat warm in summer,” he admitted.

“I’ll give you that,” Tooru agreed.

“Do you have an interest in astronomy?” Ushijima asked suddenly.

“Passing,” Tooru said. He pulled Ushijima’s chair out from his desk and sat down. “I was really into it as a kid, but I got a little distracted from it.”

“I enjoyed star-gazing with Grandfather,” Ushijima said. “We charted the progression of the planets. We were able to mark the retrograde of Mars by following it for a time.”

Tooru chuckled. “Yeah, my interest was more—” He scratched the side of his head. “Less academic,” he said. “I was, uh—looking for. Aliens.”

Ushijima didn’t respond immediately. When Tooru glanced at him, he saw that Ushijima had his hand on his chin.  “Pretty dumb, right?” Tooru said.

“Intriguing,” Ushijima returned. “I have considered the possibility of extraterrestrial life. Are you familiar with Drake’s Equation?”

“What’s that?”

“A probabilistic argument intended to determine the likelihood of intelligent civilizations in the galaxy, based on a number of variables.”

Tooru covered his grin with his index finger. “That’s the most Ushiwaka response about aliens I could imagine hearing.”

“It was created by an American astronomer in 1961.”

“That’s not the, ah…” Tooru twisted in the chair. “I bet you’re a delight to watch alien invasion movies with.”

"Movies about alien invasion are a human attempt to predict possible outcomes for a situation that might one day arise; I can't condemn them as frivolous, of course."

“They’re meant to be fun, you know.”

“Ah. Well. They are amusing.”

Silence fell, and Tooru remembered the shock of having Ushijima respond to his disappointment. _I know that I am uninteresting_. Had Tooru’s moods become more permeable to Ushijima? Or had he always known when Tooru was making dismissive comments? No—he’d liked Tooru. There was no way he’d always known how to read him.

“The telescope does still work,” Ushijima said.

“What?”

“The focus is misaligned, but if it is held carefully, it is possible to still use the telescope.”

Tooru digested this sudden information. “What are you saying, you want me to check it out?”

“If you wish. It is too bright yet for stars, but the moon is visible through the trees.”

Tooru took in the expression on Ushijima’s face; it was almost excitement. He wondered if Ushijima had ever gotten to share anything like this with someone else before. Someone he wasn’t related to, at least.

“Ah, sure.”

Tooru crouched again next to the eyepiece of the telescope. He peered through, though he found the view blocked by a black circle. “Can’t see anything,” he said.

“Here,” Ushijima returned, surprisingly close. Tooru felt him settle next to him, so near that he could sense the heat of his body. He felt more than heard Ushijima fiddle with the settings of the telescope. “Tell me when the focus is optimal,” Ushijima said.

Abruptly the moon came into focus and then left it again. “Wait!” Tooru said. “Go back!”

“Like this?”  
  
“A little more—there! That’s good.”

The telescope wasn’t terribly high quality, but Tooru was still able to see the dark seas of the moon’s surface, the bright surface in between. “There it is,” he said. “I see it now.”

“It is interesting,” Ushijima said next to his head, “to see something you encounter in passing  every day at this higher level of precision.”

“Y-yeah…” Tooru felt his heart skip. _Weird_ , he thought. He was painfully aware of how close Ushijima was. Ushijima didn’t wear any cologne, but Tooru could smell the clean fragrance of his clothes, the generic scent of his deodorant. _Weird, weird, weird._

“That’s, uh, great,” Tooru said. He leaned back from the telescope, feeling strange and unsettled.

Ushijima was still uncomfortably close. The outside light had faded so much that his face was heavily shadowed, which caused his features to stand out in stark contrast. Sharp cheekbones under dark eyes that glowed like embers in the wan light remaining, a thin-lipped mouth beneath his long nose.

 _Holy shit_ , Tooru thought.

Ushijima didn’t speak. His eyes were fixed on Tooru’s. Slowly, imperceptibly at first, he began to lean forward.

Tooru froze in shock. This wasn’t happening—the whole evening had been weird but pleasant, their conversation in the bedroom was even enjoyable on some strange level, but this— _this…_

Ushijima kept coming toward him. Tooru leaned back and hit the desk behind him. “Don’t,” he said softly, his voice weak and nervous.

Ushijima reached behind him and clicked on the lamp on the desk. Light flooded the attic and dispelled the otherworldliness of the scene—suddenly it was just a bedroom again, and they were only sitting together on the floor next to a telescope.

Tooru’s heart was hammering a mile a minute.

“What was that?” Ushijima asked as he leaned away again.

“Nothing,” Tooru said. “It was nothing.” He felt hot and cold and sick and foolish. In that instant, he’d been certain that Ushijima was going to kiss him. But that wasn’t in character, was it? Ushijima knew about Tooru’s dislike, and he’d made himself more palatable—and less present—in the time since finding out. This home visit was happenstance, a spur of the moment thing. Maybe an attempt to reach at something resembling friendship between them, which was the smart thing to do for the team. Tooru took a deep breath.

“No aliens on the moon,” he said. “That I saw.”

“They would have to be large, to spot them with that telescope.” Ushijima’s voice sounded normal, but there was something searching in his face. Tooru could see him trying to puzzle out what he’d missed. He was glad the answer wasn’t clear—yet. Perhaps Ushijima would realize later, and remember Tooru shrinking away from him.

The breeze from the window slid cold against Tooru’s flushed skin, goading him. He stood. “I should go.”

Ushijima rose to his feet, which was an intimidating gesture in and of itself in the close space. He nodded.

At the stairs, Tooru hesitated.

“What is it?” Ushijima asked.

“Your old team,” Tooru said, because he couldn’t say _Shiratorizawa_. “You got along well with them. They admired you.”

Ushijima looked confused. “Their success was contingent on mine. The coach designed the team with that in mind.”

“You’re saying it was a rank thing?”

“Of sorts.”

“Hm,” Tooru said, and didn’t elaborate. He walked down the stairs, thinking about Ushijima’s value as a teammate. It wasn’t just that he was good, or that Shiratorizawa’s strategy had focused on him; there was a steadiness to Ushijima that went beyond volleyball. Tooru was sure Ushijima’s former teammates were more attached to him than he thought, and in a bizarre twist of fate, that actually made Tooru glad. He didn’t want to feel responsible for anyone’s happiness, let alone Ushijima’s.

“Ready to go?” Ushijima’s stepdad asked, seeing them, and Tooru nodded. He said his goodbyes, and then they were wrestling the bicycle into the car and driving out of this strange, quiet little community. Ushijima had insisted Tooru sit up front.

“So what made you decide to be a—uh—the person who tosses?” Ushijima’s stepdad asked.

“Setter,” came Ushijima’s quiet voice from the back.

“I like being the center of attention,” Tooru said. “Naturally.”

Ushijima’s stepdad let out a surprised laugh.

“He’s kidding,” Ushijima said.

“Am I?”

“Yes.”

Tooru huffed a laugh. “Fine. It’s the control. I don’t like leaving decisions that affect me to other people.”

“You’re a control freak,” Ushijima’s stepdad said.

“Definitely.”

“Hm,” Stepdad said. “I guess you two do have a few things in common.”

Tooru smiled sardonically, realizing that was true. Ushijima liked to control the court too, though his method was different. Plus, he was always trying to guide Tooru’s choices—whether it was the school he went to or what he ate for dinner.

“But unlike me, Ushiwaka-chan has to rely on his setter,” Tooru said, glancing at Ushijima in the back seat. “Sucks to be him.”

“I manage,” Ushijima said, and the conversation moved on.

Tooru was glad when they pulled up to his house, and he helped heave his bike out of the back with a great sense of relief. He was alive. Nothing horrible had happened. He’d been pleasant enough, and now—hopefully—whatever debts he owed were paid. He was glad of the two weeks of freedom before training camp; he’d need at least that length of Ushijima-free time to return to his normal self.

“Thank you for coming,” Ushijima said. His stepdad had returned to the car.

“I don’t know why you’d want me to, but you’re welcome.” Tooru was eager to faceplant into the living room couch. “Thanks for having me over. And not telling your family I’ve been awful to you.”

“It was mutual,” Ushijima said, not mentioning the fact that Tooru’s awfulness had stemmed from intent and his own had stemmed from ignorance. Perhaps it didn’t matter to him.

“Maybe,” Tooru said. Then, with real cheerfulness, “Bye! See you at camp.”

Ushijima waved, and that was the end of it.

Tooru walked in his front door exhausted.

“ _Tooru_!” called Takeru’s voice. Tooru winced internally. Takeru came bounding around the corner and paused on the lip of the hallway in his socked feet, nearly quivering with excitement.

“What do you want?” Tooru whined. “I’m tired. Isn’t it your bedtime?”

“Mom said I could stay up to ask you about Ushiwaka’s house!”

“Your mom loves to torture me.”

“Is it true that he has a hundred trophies?”

Tooru hadn’t seen any displayed in the house. “How should I know?”

“What was dinner like?”

Tooru sighed and slipped out of his shoes. He stepped onto the edge of the hallway and put an arm around Takeru’s shoulders. “Takeru,” he said as he steered both of them toward the living room, “some mysteries are better left unanswered…”

  


Over the remaining weeks of vacation, Tooru found his time was wonderfully, blissfully Ushijima-free, save for a postcard that came two days after the dinner, which said “Thank you for the pleasure of your company,” in Ushijima’s steady hand. Tooru felt inclined to send a card back: “Thank you for your hospitality.” Into the card he slipped a sparkly pink hair clip; he hoped Ushijima was perceptive enough to realize the gift was for Akiko.

Although, the thought of Ushijima holding his bangs back with little glittery hair clip… Tooru admitted that he derived immense pleasure from the mental image it presented.

Two weeks passed quickly; he spent time with his family, went to movies with his friends, even went to the beach for a couple days. Before he knew it, he was packing his bag for the training camp.

Ushijima was waiting for him at the train platform.

Tooru spied him from a good distance away. He was reading a book and so didn’t see Tooru as he approached, which gave Tooru the opportunity to spy. Tooru noted the way his hair fell into his eyes—had it been that long at their dinner? He saw the simplicity of his clothes, plain but well-fitted khaki shorts, a solid-colored polo. Tooru took in the shape of Ushijima’s legs between the hem of his shorts and the cuff of his socks as he sat on the lone bench of the small platform.

Tooru remembered how his face had looked in the dark bedroom, the way it filled his vision when Ushijima leaned in. His breakfast squirmed inside his stomach, but it didn’t exactly feel like disgust.

He pushed the feeling down and put on his best smile, then resumed walking toward the bench. “Ushiwaka-chan!” he said in a lilting voice. “I would’ve thought you’d be on the train at dawn.”

Ushijima looked up. He closed his book. “The bus does not leave campus until 4pm,” he said. “It would be unnecessary to leave so early.”

“Of course,” Tooru returned. “How silly of me.”

Ushijima leaned back and seemed to smile up at the sky. “Wishful thinking on your part, I believe.”

Tooru blinked. Things really had mellowed between them if Ushijima could joke about these thing—and since when did he smile so easily?

The silence lengthened. Tooru caught Ushijima stealing glances, and inclined his head.

“You… wear glasses.”

Tooru moved a hand to his face. He’d worn glasses in case he slept on the train; he didn’t like the gummy feel of his lenses when he slept with them in. “Yes, yes. The one flaw in my otherwise perfect genetic code: poor eyesight.”

Again there was a slight smile, and Tooru wondered if today was upside-down day.

“When you say things like that, do you expect people to disagree?” Ushijima asked.

“Things like what?”

“Your _perfect genetic code_. Every time you make a vain statement, you seem to pause. Like you’re waiting for me to disagree.”

Tooru stilled—and then he laughed. Did he pause after those statements? Really? “I’m waiting for Iwa-chan to hit me. Or shout. Huh, I didn’t know I did that.”

“Him hitting you is a good thing?”

Tooru grinned. “It means he’s paying attention, at least. Ah.”

The clunking sound of a train approaching barred further conversation. Ushijima stepped forward, preparing to get on the train when it stopped, and Tooru took a breath: and so his Ushijima-free days of summer came to an end, not with a bang but with the sound of train doors opening.

They stepped in. Ushijima took a seat first, and Tooru considered the option that he keep walking past him and sit elsewhere. He was fairly certain that it wouldn’t have offended Ushijima; a month earlier it would’ve even been expected. But he had the distinct impression that such an action would mean more now, with how their—dare he admit it?—friendship had developed.

“Budge over, will you?” he insisted.

Ushijima obediently scooted across the bench, and Tooru settled in beside him. He immediately pulled out his phone and started playing a puzzle game. He wasn’t quite ready to struggle his way through hours of conversation with Ushijima just yet, and Ushijima made no comment or complaint. From the corner of his eye, Tooru watched him pick up his book and begin to read once more. Tooru caught a glance of part of the title—‘ _Intermediate Running and_ ’ was all he could see. He couldn’t help but shake his head minutely before returning to his game. The ride passed uneventfully, each connection seamless and the company tolerably reserved. They parted ways on campus to wait for the team bus at four.

An hour later, waiting for the bus with their teammates, the pressure was off. Somehow the peace between him and Ushijima had eased an undercurrent of tension in the team, too. Tooru wondered if befriending Ushijima had been an important step for the team itself, rather than the people affected. He allowed himself a moment to feel martyr-like in his goodness. _I did it for the team_ , he would say in his autobiography in the chapter that described how he let go of his grudge against Ushijima. Iwaizumi would definitely hit him for that.

The bus arrived in a haze of gasoline fumes worsened by humid, hot weather.

“All aboard,” said the head coach. The boy next to Tooru—Sanada, another first year—nudged him.

“Sit with me, will you? I need girl advice.”

“Ah? A loyal vassal requires the great Oikawa’s aid?”

Sanada punched his shoulder. “Get it all out now. Any other compliments you’d like to give yourself?”

Tooru pretended to think about it.

A third year interrupted: “Are you sure you want advice on women from a guy who doesn’t have a girlfriend?”

Another third year groaned. “Okay, Shingo. We know you have a girlfriend. You only mention it every minute.”

Shingo grinned.

“I want advice from the guy who always has five or more girls surrounding him when I see him out,” Sanada said. “Seriously, how do you do it?”

“Are you looking to start a fanclub, or do you want advice on what to say to a particular girl?” Tooru asked. He couldn’t give much advice on either subject; fanclubs formed themselves quite apart from Tooru’s influence, and he’d never had much luck dating—but he did know how to talk to people in a way that made them feel good about themselves. That he didn’t use that knowledge much was a conscious decision. He didn’t have the time, energy, or inclination to make people think he was a nice guy.

“Well, both, ideally,” Sanada said, looking wistful. The knobbly skull beneath his unfortunate buzzcut would make a fanclub unlikely, but Tooru appreciated his optimism. They piled into the bus, and Tooru readied himself for an hour or two of giving sage advice that really ought to be common sense. Ushijima settled nearby with a friend, and Tooru got the distinct impression he intended to eavesdrop.

 _Listen all you like_ , Tooru thought, suddenly smug. It amused him to think of himself as some fountain of knowledge when all his advice was so obvious: things like _ask her about her interests_ and _find common ground_. He spent an entertaining half hour advising and teasing Sanada, until a teammate who would henceforth be dead to Tooru spoke up.

“Hey, Ushijima—you get a lot of girls too. What do you do?”

Tooru froze. Did people always have to ruin a good thing?

“I have no advice,” Ushijima said shortly, making Tooru choke on a laugh. “I do nothing to attract the women who speak to me.”

Someone groaned. “That’s it, isn’t it? Unless you’re already really good-looking—or really smart, or popular—none of this advice matters.”

Tooru leaned back in his seat, eyes facing forward. _Really good-looking_. Ushijima? Wasn’t his main point of attraction just how big he was? He’d have to be more expressive in order to be considered good-looking, Tooru thought—and remembered, unbidden, the smiles at the train station that  morning.

Shit. Was Tooru causing Ushijima to be more attractive by making him loosen up? Could he claim credit for that? It was a horrible thought, no matter the truce—or friendship—between them. Iwaizumi’s growing charm had been annoying enough, however happy Tooru was for him. It’d be worse to bear it in Ushijima.

“Oikawa. Hey. Earth to Oikawa.”

Tooru blinked. He realized his teammates were staring at him, including Ushijima. “Eh, what was that?” He rubbed the back of his head. “Sorry, I was thinking about all those pretty girls waiting for me back on campus,” he said, syrupy sweet.

“Aahh!”

“Alright, already.”

“Get a load of this asshole.”

Tooru laughed through the groaning around him. He opened his eyes as he quieted and found that Ushijima was still looking at him with an inscrutable expression. No hint of the smiles that had teased his face earlier.

“Oikawa, you can’t have all the fans for yourself,” Sanada insisted beside him. “Stop being greedy.”

While his teammates chattered around him, Tooru happened to glance deeper into the bus and noticed Iseya quietly watching the proceedings from further down. It gave him a shock like cold water—if Iseya had noticed Ushijima’s feelings, had anyone else on the team? But no, no one else seemed to notice, or they knew better than to say, if they did—it was fine, Tooru told himself. It would all be fine.

Later that evening, he would want to punch his past self in the face for daring to think such a thing. It was not fine. It was the opposite of fine.

The bus pulled into the camp facilities around seven. They were immediately shuffled into the dining room for dinner, before a team meeting and dismissal at nine. Practice was set to follow breakfast, which would be served at five-thirty in the morning. Everyone was strongly encouraged to hit the baths and go to bed soon after. Already exhausted from the long day of traveling, Tooru was more than happy to follow that advice.

However—there was always a ‘however’ in his life these days—something happened in the baths before he made it to his futon that kept him awake long into the night despite his weariness. He blamed the teammate on the bus—couldn’t remember exactly who said it, which was just as well really, as he had joined the Dead-To-Oikawa-Tooru List—for planting the idea in his head.  

Good-looking. No, not just good-looking. He’d said that Ushijima was _really_ good-looking. He’d even gone so far to lump him in with Tooru’s level of attractiveness, implying that they got the attention of girls for the same reason. It was almost offensive, really. After the time they’d spent together, Tooru could grudgingly admit that Ushijima had a certain… charm. If that was what it could be called. But was he good-looking?

It wasn’t as though Tooru had planned on peeking when they were in the baths. It wasn’t a premeditated thing. But he was already soaking in the tub when Ushijima walked in, and it was too easy to surreptitiously glance over under the guise of slinking lower into the water. Only to settle the matter, he told himself.

Tall. Ushijima was very tall. When not surrounded by his teammates, Tooru was often the tallest person in the room, but Ushijima outstripped him in that regard. He was also broader than Tooru, with a shoulder-span that was half again as wide as Tooru’s own frame. His muscles lent him a drop-dead, break-a-log-in-half kind of physique, but Tooru didn’t see it often; Ushijima frequently wore clothes that left level of tone completely to the imagination.

Like this, almost everything was on display. Ushijima’s chest was perfectly smooth; his pectorals—probably larger than the span of Tooru’s own long-fingered hands—were tanned without blemish or freckle. His shoulders reminded Tooru of the ridges that he had crossed to visit Ushijima’s house, the smooth muscles in his arms seamed together like the work of a master sculptor. At the end of his arms came his wrists—corded and strong, thick enough to sustain the power of his spike—and then his hands. His hands could probably justify twenty minutes of examination to themselves. His fingers were long, but not slender like Tooru’s. Tooru laced his own fingers together under the water. He wondered if Ushijima had calluses as he did—if his hands would be rough. And his legs—Tooru suddenly realized he’d been half-ogling those legs back at the train platform, but he saw more clearly now the swell of his calves, the surge of his thighs under the edge of the towel wrapped around his waist. Above the towel was his flat stomach, his abs sharply defined with the divot of his belly button underneath, and below that, the dark line of hair that disappeared from view behind terrycloth.

Tooru felt a shiver go up his spine despite the heat of the bath. _Okay_ , he thought, while his stomach did somersaults under his diaphragm. _So he’s good-looking_. More than good-looking, even. He couldn’t help but admit that Ushijima was gorgeous below that stone face.

The thought came—unbidden, unwanted, unexpected—but it came all the same. _You could’ve had this_ , the voice said. _He would’ve been yours._

Tooru submerged fully, eyes closed. The world was reduced to darkness and the sound of his own heartbeat.

What did he want? On the bus, he’d joked about the girls waiting for him on campus. He liked girls. He liked that the ones he knew always smelled good, and that they were always wearing their hair in new and interesting ways. Still, for all his appreciation of good hygiene and fine grooming, the sum of his interest could be summarized in one word: mild.

The sudden thought of large hands on his body, on either side of his ribcage, robbed him of his last bit of breath; he surfaced quickly to take another, splashing the other two in the bath with him.

One of them was Sanada. “You trying to drown yourself?”

“Mm. Good way to get out of five-thirty practice.”

If his thoughts continued this way, perhaps he’d try harder. He looked away as Ushijima joined them, glad the heat of the bath made the redness of his face self-explanatory. He was hyperaware of his nakedness, and worse, the thought of Ushijima touching him was still blossoming into fantasy in the back of his mind.

Wanting to be touched by Ushijima—that was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Letting Ushijima touch him would be the equivalent of letting him win. Enjoying it would be losing.

Right?

“You really don’t like getting up early, do you?” Sanada asked. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look so morose.”

Tooru leaned his head back. “A man needs his beauty sleep.” _And to come to terms with sexual feelings he might have towards a guy he still wants to outmatch._

“I might wake you up a few times then,” Sanada said innocently, and Tooru smiled.

“I take how threatened you are by my natural charm as a compliment.”

Tooru chanced a look at Ushijima again. He looked perfectly content, as usual, not a ripple of stress on those sharp features. Nothing to indicate that he was unnerved by the fact he shared a bath with the person he had confessed love to just a couple months earlier.

Tooru shook his head. He was tired, he rationalized. He was light-headed from the bath. He’d been confused that night at Ushijima’s house, when he felt like Ushijima might kiss him. He hadn’t wanted it then. He didn’t want it now, did he?

His discomfort amplified. He remembered again Ushijima’s face right in front of his, the smell and heat of him in close quarters. He felt chill again, and goosebumps broke out on his arms.

“Well, I’ll leave you old men to it,” he said abruptly. “I’m going to bed.”

“Old men—”

“Oikawa, you’re older than me by six months.”

“Age is in the mind, don’t you know,” Tooru said. He winked. “For example, Ushiwaka here—” Ushijima looked up, and Tooru’s heart thumped. He ignored it and continued. “Ushiwaka here is probably the oldest person I know.”

“That’s true,” Sanada agreed.

“He’s definitely not a young person.”

Ushijima inclined his head. “This discussion is illogical,” he said. “Today I am eighteen. Tomorrow I will be nineteen.”

Tooru stopped, blinking as he digested this information.

“It’s your birthday tomorrow?” Sanada asked. “At camp? That sucks!”

“It matters little. It would be my birthday regardless of location.”

“Yeah, but…”

“I’m going to bed,” Tooru said quietly. “Goodnight.” He stood out of the bath, hardly hearing the _goodnight’s_ from the others.

“Goodnight, Oikawa,” Ushijima’s voice rumbled beneath him. Tooru swore he felt it reverb in his chest. He hastily grabbed a towel to cover himself.

He dried his hair as he walked down the hall toward the room where their futons had been laid out. The first years were all together, meaning Ushijima would be in the same room. Would he have bedhead in the morning? Tooru wondered. He shook his head again. This was ridiculous. He veered at the end of the hallway, heading for the vending machines instead of the beds. A ginger soda would clear his mind and settle his stomach. Then he would sleep and everything would be fine.

Although—when he woke up, it would be Ushijima’s birthday, and if Tooru wanted to snipe at him for the crime of looking good naked it would be unwarranted and mean. You couldn’t nag at a person on their birthday. God, Tooru’s realizations had the worst timing. The _worst_. He drank the soda too fast to punish himself, savoring the uncomfortable tingle in his nose.

 _Serves you right_ , he told his traitor body. He threw the can in the recycling and returned to the bedroom, getting into his futon and closing his eyes tightly. If he was home he’d lie on his back staring at the ceiling, but here he curled onto his side, wanting to be able to pretend to sleep, or at least to pretend to be sleepy. He didn’t want anyone to talk to him.

Ushijima wasn’t his rival anymore. There was lingering resentment, because Tooru wasn’t capable of letting go of grudges—his body rebelled against forgiving and forgetting—but that resentment no longer had a use. There was no purpose to that old anger, not when Ushijima would back down from a fight.

Or would he back down? If Tooru organized some sort of face-off, would Ushijima say no?

Brainstorming about possible ways to compete with Ushijima kept Tooru’s mind active for a while, and turned towards progress. It relaxed him, that old competitiveness, and perhaps that relaxation allowed him to consider what might lay beyond this theoretical face-off—because the point of conflict was resolution, wasn’t it? And what did he want that resolution to look like?

He rolled, stomach squirming. No one here could read thoughts; he was allowed to think these things to himself, in private. Ushijima’s physique was… nice. It was easy to imagine what it might be like with him, if Tooru excised their personalities from the fantasy. It would be overwhelming, heady. The strength in that body…

Footsteps brought Tooru’s fantasies to a halt, and he forced himself to relax.

“He asleep already?” Sanada asked, voice loud.

Ushijima’s was quiet. “Don’t shout.”

Tooru didn’t respond, but he gave his eyes a mental roll at the consideration Ushijima showed, right when Tooru didn’t want it. _I get it, Ushiwaka-chan,_ he thought. _You’re a good person. Good-ish. You can stop hammering on about it now._ Unfortunately, Tooru suspected that the whole being a good, straightforward person thing wasn’t any sort of act. Maybe one day that would stop pissing him off.

One day.

  


The next day, Tooru got up early to ask the coach not to put him and Ushijima on the same practice teams, saying they’d gotten into the habit of playing together and the team was losing some versatility as a result. Coach Yamamura agreed and thanked Tooru for his insight, which made him feel just a bit bad for having only his own interests at heart.

Those interests were, of course, spending the day competing with Ushijima, winning, and no longer feeling like all paths led to him being the loser. The first win of the day was being a bigger person, and Tooru achieved this by visiting the vending machine on his way back from talking to the coach. He collected a single packet of strawberry milk before making his way over to Ushijima’s futon and crouching down.

Ushijima did have bedhead, it turned out—his fringe stuck up in something almost statement-like—but there was none of that morning weakness Tooru would have loved to see. Tooru sat on his haunches next to Ushijima’s futon and nudged his forehead with the cold packet of strawberry milk.

“Happy birthday,” Tooru said. Ushijima took the milk wordlessly, and Tooru stood up.

“What?” Ushijima said, and his voice was gravelly.

“Many happy returns,” Tooru said, so he’d understand. “I would have gotten you something if I’d known, but—well, maybe I wouldn’t have. We’ll never know. Bye!”

He left, feeling smug. Okay, be bigger person: check. One win. It was a good start to the day, and Ushijima’s totally stunned face made it better. By their first break, Tooru was feeling buoyant, keeping track of the score as his team and Ushijima’s competed against each other. It was seven versus six in Tooru’s favor—and then came the measurements of personal bests. Tooru had the faster personal time on sprints, and he was smiling smugly when they lined up to test reach. He felt rather than saw Ushijima line up behind him.

“Are we competing?” Ushijima asked in a low voice, and Tooru turned to look at him.

“Yes.” Tooru bounced on the balls of his feet, still pleased with himself for coming up with this plan in the first place.

“When competing, it’s considered polite to let competitors know the race has started.”

“When have I ever been polite?”

Ushijima smiled slightly. “You are capable of it. I suppose what matters is the inclination.”

“Which I lack,” Tooru said. “Usually.”

“It has its own sort of charm.”

Tooru blinked. Was that a compliment? He hoped not. “I’m not going easy on you.”

“I wouldn’t wish it. How am I doing?”

“You’re losing.”

“Ah. And what are we competing for?”

Tooru didn’t know the answer to that. Honor? Personal satisfaction? If Ushijima won, would Tooru be more reluctant to explore the feelings that had so unsettled him last night? Would this buoyant mood dissipate and transform back into the old resentment?

He wasn’t that petty, was he?

“Doesn’t matter,” Tooru said. “I plan to win.”

Ushijima’s gaze was intent, trying to puzzle him out. It was a useless effort; if Tooru couldn’t work out his feelings there was no hope of Ushijima doing so. Ushijima seemed to come to the same conclusion.

“I’m not in the habit of losing,” he said eventually. “You might have to reconsider your plan.”

Tooru faced forward. “We’ll see.”

As Tooru expected, there was little to no change in Ushijima’s level of play once he’d been made aware of their ongoing competition. It simply wasn’t in Ushijima to give less at practice than he would under challenge. He went into everything he did with the same single-minded determination to achieve perfection—anything less would be a betrayal of his nature.

By midday, Tooru had hit his stride, already feeling as though the weeks he’d spent on vacation hadn’t happened; he had always been on this court, with this team. He had always had the volleyball against his fingertips; he had always been staring down Ushijima on the other side of the net. This was the game he remembered. This was the place he was supposed to be.

They didn’t speak at lunch, which heightened the sense of their separation—by the time they made it back to practice again, Tooru almost felt that the universe was shifting back into its rightful alignment. The tally continued. Ten wins to Ushijima, nine to Tooru. Twelve for Tooru to Ushijima’s eleven. Thirteen. Fifteen. Eighteen. Twenty.

The sun hung low in the sky when their coaches finally called their practice for the day. Tooru was so tired he felt sick to his stomach. His legs felt like rubber, his hands trembled from the strain. His neck hurt, his back ached, and he was so hungry he felt as though his stomach was trying to eat his liver—but the final score of their competition was twenty-two to twenty-one, in his favor. He had won.

He tracked down Ushijima where he stood to the side of the court with a towel around his shoulders while he chugged from a water bottle. Tooru noted he was sweating heavily, that his bearing held a small but perceptible level of fatigue. He opened his mouth, ready to brag, ready to gloat about his victory—but then Ushijima turned to him and spoke first.

“Thank you for today, Oikawa,” he said.

And like that, Tooru felt the stopper lift on the scene, and the illusion was shattered. They weren’t rivals. They weren’t enemies. They were on the same team together, and he had played his best because of it.

Tooru closed his mouth. He stewed for a moment before asking, “What do you mean, thank you?”

“I don’t believe much in special days. People should strive to make every day a personal best. But—today is how I would have chosen to celebrate, if there had been a choice in the matter.”

 _His birthday._ Ushijima thought the competition was a birthday present, and not the symptom of an ongoing personality crisis. It almost made Tooru laugh. He thought about disillusioning him, of scrunching his nose and protesting that the competition hadn’t been for Ushijima’s sake at all, and he shouldn’t be so presumptuous—but Tooru liked the thought of being seen as that perceptive. He flapped a hand, smug again. “All in a day’s work.”

Again Ushijima looked like he wished he could puzzle him out, and Tooru delighted in the fact that he wouldn’t be able to. It made him feel safe, somehow, knowing he could still have his secrets—even as something inside him continued to soften towards someone he used to hate.

 

Tooru was so tired he was barely able to chew his dinner, and afterward he ran a real risk of drowning in the baths, but he managed to stay awake until he could crawl into his futon.

He was asleep within the same minute, though.

  


Camp progressed at a similar pace throughout the week, though Tooru no longer spent himself utterly trying to best Ushijima in every category. He was aware of a charge between them: a continuation of that day of competition. Now it was there when they were allies as well, a force that pulled something out of both of them to make them bigger than the sum of their parts. It made their earlier partnership seem more like a stalemate; only now were they truly on the same side.

Or perhaps Tooru was imagining things. That was possible too.

Meanwhile, the relative peace of being on good terms with Ushijima allowed him more time to stew on his inconvenient attraction, which he was determined to consider only in physical terms—a chemical thing that stemmed mostly from the frequent glimpses he got of Ushijima’s powerful body, whether Ushijima was in the baths or spiking or even sitting on a bench with his elbows on his knees, listening to the coaches. Sometimes Tooru could even convince himself that the only thing causing his fascination was a hitherto-unknown desire to have sex with someone with exactly Ushijima’s body type. Sometimes. The fact that he couldn’t imagine himself asking Ushijima for a one night stand despite Ushijima’s stated attraction threw a wrench in that theory. It wasn’t just the awkwardness that request would cause that kept Tooru from asking, but also an unwillingness to use Ushijima’s feelings for his own purposes like that. He cared about Ushijima now, whatever that meant. He enjoyed Ushijima’s more frequent smiles, the steady humor in their interactions.

With so much unresolved, things were bound to come to a head sooner or later—but for his part, Tooru would have preferred ‘later’. When a calmer training day led to the team having enough energy to stay up to talk, Tooru found himself in the place he least wanted to be: a group discussing who they were attracted to, with Ushijima in it.

“I just want to touch boobs this year,” second-year spiker Amagi confessed. “Just once would be enough.”

Tooru’s face fell into his hands. _How_ had they gotten to this subject? There had been a card game. When had those cards been put aside? How obvious would it be if he said he wanted another round?

A glance at Ushijima told him nothing; Ushijima looked calm enough, but then, only some of his moods were readable.

“You don’t care who they’re attached to?” Sanada asked, a smile at his lips.

“Barely.”

“Who’s up for another game?” Tooru asked weakly, still looking for the cards. He spotted them in Sanada’s hand, the one furthest from him, but when he reached Sanada held them away.

“Come on,” Sanada said. “This is team bonding time. Who do you like? And if there’s no one in particular, what do you like?”

Tooru sighed. “I don’t know. I’m open to a lot, I guess.”

“That’s surprising,” the quiet Iseya said, and Tooru quirked a brow.

“Yeah,” Amagi said. “I would have thought you’re really particular. Why else are you single?”

“It’s not being particular,” Tooru said. “Dating someone means you need to spend time with them. I’m not willing to give up my free time.”

Sanada groaned. “Sometimes I really hate you, you know. I’d _love_ to give up my free time.” He nudged Ushijima. “What about you, Ushijima-kun? Pining away?”

Tooru stiffened, and saw Iseya had stilled too. Damn insightful people, anyway, and why did Iseya even care? Tooru kept his gaze on his knee, stomach twisting.

“There was… something,” Ushijima said. It was the first time Tooru had known him to be vague. “I have no expectations. It will pass.”

The mood dropped immediately, and Tooru saw sympathy in his teammates’ faces. He hoped he looked sympathetic instead of like his guts were twisting themselves into knots.

“You mean you’re trying to give up because you were rejected?” Amagi said. “Or you never even tried?”

“I was rejected. With good cause.”

Tooru met Iseya’s gaze, uncomfortable. What did he want from Tooru? For him to apologize to Ushijima? He’d already done that.

“Sorry, man,” Sanada said, clapping Ushijima on the back. “That sucks. Can we go back to how much Amagi wants to touch a boob? I think I preferred that.”

“If he’s desperate,” Ushijima said, “Perhaps the udder of a cow or sheep would do. I imagine it’s similar.”

Sanada burst out laughing while Amagi complained loudly, and some of the tension eased. Tooru finally allowed himself to look at Ushijima, and caught him looking back. He wasn’t stony-faced, this time—there was a certain openness to his expression—and Tooru thought that look was something of an apology.

For putting Tooru in the awkward position of hearing Ushijima’s side of the story? Or for having feelings in the first place? Tooru didn’t like either option. He wished he could leave, and get back to his futon, and stew on this.

 _It will pass_ , his mind echoed. It’d pass, and Ushijima would find someone else he admired—someone who was a better person. Someone who could reciprocate without twisting himself into knots. Someone not Tooru.

Tooru could almost hear the creak of a door closing. _There goes that option you never thought you wanted_.

He excused himself at the first possible moment, and didn’t look at Ushijima again that night.

  


The last morning of their summer camp dawned cool and damp. White fog hung over most of the grounds, giving each building the illusion of being isolated in a cloud. It reminded Tooru of another fateful morning—the day he’d tried to apologize to Ushijima. That apology had turned into another sort of argument, hadn’t it? But from that argument came Ushijima’s apology, and after that, the gradual blossoming of a partnership that bore only Tooru’s normal level of antagonism.

Maybe that was the answer, Tooru thought as he mulled over his rice at breakfast. Maybe he just needed to sit down and talk it out with Ushijima. Surely his recent conflicting feelings were just an artifact of the strange summer he’d had, Ushijima’s confession and the rustic pleasantness of his home, the way his face had looked in the fading light that night.

And there was also the fact that his attraction to Tooru had been so blatant, so unwavering. Everyone wanted to be desired, right? Everyone hoped to be wanted. Ushijima had backed off the moment he realized his affections weren’t reciprocated, about which Tooru had been and still was immensely relieved. But, he wondered, but…

What would it have felt like for that blazing intensity to focus on him, what would it have felt like to have been the conscious recipient of that attention, if he had wanted it? If he’d been able to welcome it?

Did he like Ushijima? The thought gave him pause. He set down his rice. The egg he’d broken into the bowl felt as though it were congealing in his throat. Was it really that simple? After all, he’d always known what Ushijima looked like. His hulking form and scowling face had been etched into the back of Tooru’s eyelids since middle school. So why had Ushijima’s face grown so pleasant to him? Why had his body set Tooru on fire?

Could it be that it was more than an attraction? Had Tooru’s dislike been cancelled out by Ushijima’s strange thoughtfulness? His dry humor? The telescope in his attic, the photos on his wall? Was it seeing Ushijima with his family that had made him into a real person in Tooru’s mind, or had the transformation happened before that? Could he _like_ Ushijima—not just his body, but who he was? The unfashionable, straightforward guy who’d made Tooru’s life hell?

Tooru found that he couldn’t finish his breakfast.

He managed to avoid Ushijima until practice, though he hoped it wasn’t too obvious what he was doing. The last thing he wanted was to call attention to himself after the previous night’s conversation. He tried to focus as their practice games heated up, but he knew even before he tossed each time that he wasn’t at his best; his serve went wide two turns in a row, and the third time the other team received it easily, which was almost worst.

“Oikawa!” Coach Yamamura said. “Focus up!”

Tooru shouted back an affirmative, because coaches could get prickly when you didn’t, but he wasn’t sure what to do differently. He kept hesitating a moment too long, or changing his mind at the last moment, and his usual reflexes couldn’t keep up. When he fumbled a toss to Sanada, and Sanada landed badly, his stomach dropped.

“Take a break,” Yamamura told the teams on this side of the gym, walking to Sanada, who had fallen. Tooru was at Sanada’s side already, apologizing.

“Not your fault,” Sanada said. “I think I twisted my ankle. That’s all.”

Tooru helped him over to a bench at the side of the gym and sent a teammate to find ice. He missed Iwaizumi with sudden fierceness, remembering how this used to be his job on their old team, though he’d explained to Tooru how to check the injury. Once the shoe was off, Tooru poked and prodded, deducing that it _was_ just a twisted ankle, though it would still put Sanada out of commission for a while.

“Oikawa,” Yamamura said. “A word?”

Tooru made sure Sanada was in good hands, then stood and walked with his coach, ready to be reprimanded even if the thought made his stomach twist. Yamamura tended to stay back at practice, silently observing the scene while the specialty coaches ran the show. He had a hawkish nose beneath round wire-rimmed glasses, which added to his shrewd appearance.

“Your play today has been abysmal,” Yamamura said. “These camps are meant to improve your play, not detract from it. After we got all those alums in to train you I expected to see more.”

“I understand,” Tooru said. “I’m sorry.”

“I’ve been wanting to put you into regular matches more often to give Miyake-kun a break, but now I’m not so sure—”

“It was my fault,” came a new voice. Ushijima—just who Tooru didn’t want to see. He’d walked up and stood at Tooru’s shoulder. Tooru didn’t look up, though the shoulder nearest Ushijima prickled with uncomfortable awareness of his proximity. “I apologize. We argued last night.”

“Argued?” the coach said.

Ushijima gestured in a way that said the argument’s subject was immaterial. The coach’s lips pressed together.

“It won’t happen again,” Tooru said. He wanted to say they hadn’t argued, but it would paint Ushijima as a liar. Then again, he _was_ lying.

Tooru had never expected Ushijima to lie.

“You need a break?” the coach asked Tooru.

“Just until after lunch,” Tooru said. That would be enough time to make his hands stop shaking with guilt and embarrassment, wouldn’t it?

The coach nodded. “Stay with Sanada, then, until you can play.”

Tooru bowed in thanks and apology and moved towards Sanada, but Ushijima stopped him before they could get back within earshot. Perhaps that was better, though Tooru saw the coach watching them from the corner of the gym.

“You shouldn’t lie for me,” Tooru told Ushijima. “It doesn’t suit you.”

“I heard him say he was reconsidering how often to put you in. The team would suffer if he took a measure like that.”

“His concerns were valid.”

“It was my fault,” Ushijima said, in an echo of his words to the coach. “The lie about arguing was one of self-preservation. I knew my feelings made you uncomfortable, and I still spoke of them last night. I’m sorry. I thought saying I had no expectations would set you at ease.”

Tooru clenched his jaw around an angry _well, it didn’t_. He wasn’t angry at Ushijima; he was frustrated at life in general. Why was nothing ever easy?

“You know I mean it,” Ushijima continued. “You shouldn’t be—”

“Can you shut up?” Tooru demanded, louder and sharper than was necessary. “Can you just leave me alone for once?”

Ushijima paused before his response. Tooru felt his words hang in the air between them like a palpable veil.  “Of course,” Ushijima said quietly, before he turned and walked away.

Tooru put his face in his hands. Had he always been this awful to everyone? He hadn’t felt this dark and sick inside in a long time. He wished Iwaizumi was there to headbutt him.

He crossed to the bench where Sanada sat lengthways with his leg stretched in front of him, an icepack on his swelling ankle. “I’m really sorry, Sacchan,” Tooru mumbled.

“Aw, hell, man,” Sanada said. “I should’ve known better than to jump at that shitty toss.” He patted the bench next to him, and Tooru sat down. “I tell you what, you can make it up to me by introducing me to all your girlfriends.” He waggled his eyebrows. “What’dya think? Girls love a good injury, right?”

Tooru felt himself smile wanly in return.

Sanada leaned against him. The casual contact made Tooru feel a little more grounded. At least Sanada wasn’t mad, didn’t blame him as much as he deserved the blame.

“So what’s the shit?” Sanada asked.

“I’m sorry?”

“You’re a mess today. Everyone can see. What’s the shit?”

Tooru looked up out at the court. Ushijima was chatting with one of the assistant coaches, looking over the playbook in the coach’s hand. He didn’t appear out of sorts in the slightest, but Tooru knew him well enough at this point—he knew that his words had probably hurt.

“I’m the shit,” Tooru said.

Sanada put his palm to his mouth and blew a loud raspberry. “Boooo!” he said, making a thumbs down gesture. “What’s the shit, Oikawa?”

“Sanada,” Tooru said, “I’m trying really hard to feel guilty about what happened to you.”

“That’s good. The sympathy card will be super useful. You can tell all the girls how brave I was. Then I can make this face—” He made an expression that said _I’m in pain but I’m trying not to show it_.

“Charming,” Tooru intoned, but he felt a real smile begin to tease the corners of his mouth. He glanced up again at the court. His mistake hadn’t seemed to cast too much of a pall over the rest of the practice.

He was being stupid. There was nothing special or earth-shattering about having a crush on someone. Certainly it wasn’t worth tanking his whole college volleyball career. And hadn’t Ushijima labored under his feelings for god knows how long? He hadn’t let it affect his level of play.

That was it, then. Tooru couldn’t lose to him in this aspect either. He’d get his thoughts in order outside of the court. He sat up straighter. No headbutting needed. Iwaizumi would be so proud of him.

 _Stop thinking of me when you’re having a moral dilemma,_ Iwaizumi’s voice said in his head, and Tooru grinned.

“Hey, Sacchan,” Tooru said.

“What?”

“When we tell the girls what happened, we’ll say you twisted your ankle while scoring on the winning play.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah.” Tooru leaned back against Sanada and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Now listen, here’s how we’ll spin it…”

  


As he had promised the coach, by lunch time he felt more like himself and was ready to get on the court again. Ushijima gave him a wide berth, just as he had in the immediate aftermath of Tooru’s rejection. Tooru knew he’d eventually have to apologize, but for now he was grateful for the distance.

Though he didn’t achieve the level of ability he’d had earlier in the week, when the bus came at four to take them back to campus, Tooru was satisfied that he was making progress. He was confident he’d be back on his game by the time their usual practice resumed—and for the most part that prediction proved true. After a free day of rest and relaxation and no uncomfortable conversations, Tooru was just as good as he had been before. However, it seemed like his poor performance at camp on the last day had made a lasting impression, or perhaps his fake argument with Ushijima had. He found out after their second day back to the normal schedule, when he was about to head for the showers.

“Oikawa.” It was Yamamura again, head coach extraordinaire.

“Yes, Coach,” he said.

“A word, please.”

“Of course.”

Tooru had heard other players call Yamamura intimidating, but he hadn’t gotten that vibe until this moment, standing near his exit but unable to make his escape—and an escape it was. The determined look on Yamamura’s face said the word would be a serious one.

Yamamura crossed his arms. “I’ve been thinking about what happened during our away camp. The way an argument with Ushijima affected you.”

Tooru nodded wordlessly, throat thick with nervousness.

“I know you two were rivals in your prefecture, but here, you’re on the same team. I thought we would be able to utilize you—”

“You are,” Tooru interrupted. His palms were sweating. _Don’t put me on probation—_

“Please allow me to finish. I thought we would be able to use you as a lethal combination, but perhaps this friction between the two of you is lasting. I know I’ve had rivals I outright hated in the past. Well—one. If that’s you and Ushijima, this situation isn’t sustainable. And much as it pains me to say this to one of our most promising new players, it would be possible for you to transfer to another team.”

Tooru’s heart seemed to stop. “What?”

Yamamura smiled. “I thought that might catch your interest. Top players have a lot of opportunities regular ones couldn’t dream of. If you wanted to transfer to another team—and there are plenty that would have you, even at this point—I could make it easier for you. I hate to see talent go to waste.”

Tooru couldn’t help a little sound of wry laughter, quickly stifled. Yamamura looked at him inquiringly.

“Sorry,” Tooru said, and when Yamamura seemed intent on listening for an explanation, he added: “If you’d offered me that in the first week of April I would have jumped at the chance. But now there’s nothing I want less.”

Yamamura looked surprised—and pleased.

“I care about this team,” Tooru said. “I like everyone on it. Including Ushijima. It was barely an argument; I overreacted to something he said. That’s all.”

“Really,” said Yamamura. Not a question: simply a thinking noise.

“Please don’t try to transfer me,” Tooru said. “I can make Ushijima into the best player he can be. It doesn’t matter that we used to be rivals.”

 _Well, it does, but not on the court_.

Yamamura nodded. “I won’t pretend I’m not relieved.”

Tooru bowed slightly. “Thank you for your consideration. And for not tossing me out.”

“Against your will? Wouldn’t dream of it.” Yamamura patted him on the shoulder. “The best he can be, huh? I like that confidence.”

Tooru smiled. “It’s just the truth.”

Yamamura grinned, and gestured for Tooru to leave. As he did, he took a deep breath, feeling better than he had in awhile.

He’d chosen this team. He’d chosen it knowingly, this time, even though Ushijima was on it. He’d been awful to Ushijima yet again, and there was the whole crush thing to work out, but he was confident they’d resolve it all somehow. Perhaps not how he wanted it resolved, but they would.

His legs were shaky with a mix of relief and terror as he left the gym, and he might have leaned on something for a bit if he didn't run into Iseya just outside the door. He pulled up short, irritation already growing. Why did Iseya always seem to be there at the worst times?

“Oikawa,” Iseya said.

“Iseya,” he returned.

“I forgot my pads.”

“I see.”

Iseya continued to linger. Tooru realized he had the same awkward bearing he’d worn that fateful afternoon when he told Tooru that Ushijima liked him.

“Oh god,” Tooru groaned. “I’m too tired for this. Just tell me what it is. What do you want to say?”

Iseya made a pained grin. “I’m still right about you being perceptive,” he said. He scratched the side of his head. “I overheard.” He gestured back at the gym. “With Yamamura.”

“It wasn’t a secret meeting.” Tooru wracked his brain to remember if he’d said anything that could be misconstrued and came up with nothing.

“I know, but—” Iseya looked at him carefully. “Did you mean what you said?”

“What did I say?”

“About staying. About Ushijima.”

Tooru grimaced. He was tired and starving and he had to pee. He grabbed Iseya’s shoulders from behind and began to shove him down the path toward the cafeteria. “Dining hall closes at nine and I’d really like to eat tonight,” he said. Then he added, “Yes. I meant it. I’m turning over a new leaf, Iseya. You’ll see a new Oikawa Tooru, one who doesn’t sabotage or devastate teammates.”

“But about Ushijima specifically,” Iseya insisted as he let Tooru push him.

Tooru stopped walking. What was Iseya’s damage, anyway? Maybe—maybe he’d noticed Tooru’s feelings? But—Tooru shook his head quickly to clear it, and started walking again. No, he hadn’t told anyone. And he hadn’t made any advances or attempts to woo as Ushijima had at the beginning of the spring semester. No, his secret was safe.

“You noticed us on the rocks, huh?” he asked. It was the same as the coach. Iseya was concerned about the team. It was the whole reason he’d spoken to Tooru that first time as well.

“But things are better now, you said.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Tooru insisted irritably. “Everything is fine! Everything is _great_.”

Iseya was silent for a long thoughtful moment. “Right,” he said. “That’s good.” He ducked away from Tooru’s hands. “Ah, thanks Oikawa!”

“For what?”

“For…” He shrugged. “Peace of mind?”

Tooru crinkled his nose and stepped back with a hand on his hip. “You’re a weird guy, Seya-chan,” he said.

“Yeah, we all fit right in together,” Iseya returned. He turned and waved over his shoulder as he walked away.

Tooru watched him go for the span of a few seconds. Then his stomach growled so loudly that he was relieved no one was around to hear it. _Dinner, bath, homework, bed_ , he thought. _Hopefully in that order._ Then the next morning, Tooru would unveil the new Oikawa. The one who was closer to the person he should’ve been since April. There was still time. After all, it was only his second semester.

  


The next day was abysmally hot, and after his morning class it was all Tooru could do to crawl back to his dorm, strip to his boxers, and flop onto his bed. He whined pitifully at the scratch of sheets against his bare skin.

From the recesses of his bag, he heard his phone start ringing. He groaned out loud before realizing there was no one in the room with him to hear his complaints. Then he flopped over until he could reach his bag and shove his hand inside.

It was Iwaizumi. Tooru answered the call and put the phone on speaker before setting it next to his head on the pillow. “Iwa-chan,” he said. “Save me. I’m melting.”

“What did you do.”

“What did I do? I didn’t do anything.”

“Oikawa,” Iwaizumi’s voice was dark and calamitous. “I know you did something. What did you do?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Tooru said. It was too hot to think. His brain felt like mush.

“So you weren’t behind that phone call this morning.”

“What phone call?”

Iwaizumi was silent on the other end. Tooru could almost see him stewing. “You’re not shitting me, are you?” Iwaizumi asked.

Tooru laughed despite himself. “What are you talking about?” he insisted. “Who called you?”

“I want you to guess.”

“Iwa-chan! C’mon. I’m melting here, remember?”

“Just guess.”

“I don’t know. My mom.”

“Nope. Try again.”

“Kyouken.”

“That’s two outs.”

“I don’t know. Help me out here.”

“It was Ushijima.”

Tooru sat up so quickly that he almost fell off his bed. “Ushiwaka?!”

“I don’t know how he got my number. Hell, I didn’t think he even knew my name!”

“He… he doesn’t,” Tooru stammered, remembering the conversation in Ushijima’s house. “Or he didn’t… I don’t know…” He took the phone off speaker and put it next to his ear. Sitting up, he was able to pull up one knee and rest his arm on it so he could push his sweaty hair off his forehead. “What did he say?”

“You sure you didn’t put him up to this?”

“Why would I do that! Tell me what he said!” Tooru knew he sounded desperate; he knew if they’d been together in person, Iwaizumi would be giving him that look that said _are you crazy or just stupid_?—but he didn’t really care.

“It was so weird, actually. He barely said hello and then just launched right into this apology. Said he was sorry about how he acted in high school. Wanted to tell me I was a worthy opponent or something. I can’t remember how he worded it.”

Tooru groaned out loud and covered his face. “Oh god,” he moaned, mortified. “I think that actually _might_ be my fault.”

“I’m shocked.”

“What else did he say?”

“Not much really. He asked if I was still playing and where. I think he was just trying to be polite.”

Tooru wanted to die. Maybe he could crawl under the bed and stay there all week. “Yeah,” he said. “That sounds like him.”

“So, do you care to explain to me what the hell that was about?”

“I… sort of…” Tooru puffed up his cheeks and let it all out in a big exhale. He told Iwaizumi about the night they were playing cards, how upset he had been after, how Sanada got hurt, how it was his fault, how Ushijima had lied for him and how he’d responded by being an ass, and the conversation with his coach the night before. “I think maybe he felt bad again about how he dismissed our team, and since he’s avoiding me—”

“I got the honor,” Iwaizumi said.

Tooru nodded. He knew Iwaizumi couldn’t see him but hoped he would somehow know he was doing it. “I know I need to apologize again, but I’ve been too much of a coward just yet.”

There was a pause. “Oikawa,” Iwaizumi said, “listen…”

Tooru knew that tone.

“If he upsets you that much,” Iwaizumi began, “why don’t you take the coach’s offer to transfer? It was funny at the beginning of the year. Now I’m starting to think it might actually be bad for your future if you stay on a team with him.”

“It’s not like that,” Tooru said. “I’m not transferring. I want to play here.”

“He makes you miserable, though. I don’t understand why you’re so adamant about this. This isn’t some stupid game for you to win anymore. Tanking the whole team for your own petty reasons—”

“It’s not like that!” Tooru insisted.

“Are you sure?” Iwaizumi asked. “I know you tried making friends with him, but he sure seems to still get under your skin a lot.”

“Not the way you think,” Tooru said quickly. He immediately winced at himself.

“...what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Ah, well.” He cursed the heat for melting his brain and making him less quick on the draw. “I just meant that, it isn’t like before. That’s all.”

In the long span of their friendship, Tooru had learned many things about Iwaizumi Hajime. How meticulously he washed his hands before dinner. How he preferred his omurice (only a little ketchup). And, perhaps most useful, how long he tended to pause before he got really angry. One second: that wasn’t so bad. Three seconds: Tooru might nurse a bruise later. Six seconds: he should take a few steps back. Ten seconds: Tooru better get a running start.

Iwaizumi paused for thirteen full seconds. Tooru felt his life flash before his eyes. “Iwa—”

“Oikawa,” Iwaizumi said, his voice perfectly calm, “please tell me what this is about.”

 _Oh my god,_ Tooru thought. _He must reset after twelve_. He felt hysterical laughter bubble up. He managed to hold it down after a few desperate-sounding chuckles escaped. “It’s—oh, man. I can’t believe I’m about to say this.”

“What?”

Tooru covered his eyes with his hand. “Iwa-chan. I… I like him. I like Ushiwaka.” There. He said it. He slowly lowered his arm. The words filled his mouth again, flowing more easily this time. “I really like Ushiwaka.”

“....what? What do you mean, you like him?”

“Just that! I like him!” Tooru sat forward on his bed with his hand braced in between his knees. “Iwa-chan!” he half-shouted into the phone. “I think I might be in love with Ushijima Wakatoshi!”

“That’s… not possible.”

“I _know_ !” Tooru flopped back onto his bed. “How did this _happen_ to me?”

“No, this is... No.” Iwaizumi made a frustrated noise. “You hate him.”

Tooru nodded. “I do. Or, I did. Or, I don’t know. Maybe I still do, a little bit?”

“Since when is… when did this start?”

“I don’t know, Iwa. Maybe it was when I went to his house? Did you know that he actually teased me? Just a little bit.” Tooru smiled at the memory. “He has a baby sister and I swear he glows a little when he’s near her. He has these stupid little dogs. I don’t know where I got the idea he was selfish or spoiled. He works really hard. He helps his grandma. _He calls his stepdad_ _Inomoto-san_.”

“Holy shit,” Iwaizumi cut in. “You actually do love him.”

“I still want to serve a ball in his face sometimes,” Tooru said. “But I think he’d actually like it if I tried, especially if he knew what I was doing. He’d laugh.”

There was another long silence, and eventually Tooru said tentatively, “Iwa-chan? What are you thinking?”

Iwaizumi groaned. “That this means I have to hang out with him too.”

“What?”

“If you’re in love with him, and he’s in love with you, I’m going to have to hang out with him. Eventually.”

Tooru’s stomach felt funny. Not painful or tied into knots for once, but fluttery and strange, with the rest of his body buzzing around it. “Iwa-chan… are you giving me your blessing?”

“My blessing? Please don’t make me responsible for this. Oh my god, Oikawa. _Ushijima_. Hanging out with us.”

Tooru began to grin. “You know what? That’s exactly how I felt when I found out he was on the team.”

“You would.”

“Would what?”

“Fall in love with someone we hate just to get back at me for not being sympathetic enough. Did I laugh at you? I don’t remember. I must have.”

Tooru laughed. “I’m not sure. But you’re never sympathetic enough, Iwa-chan. I think you told me the universe didn’t revolve around me, or something. Rude.”

Iwaizumi sighed, but it was a sigh halfway to being a laugh. Tooru could picture him rubbing his forehead. “Well. Good luck, I guess.”

“Good luck?” Tooru couldn’t stop grinning. He was giddy with Iwaizumi’s reluctant acceptance, as if by virtue of Iwaizumi accepting their possible relationship it might happen.

“I do want you to be happy. I guess. Ugh! I can’t believe you’re making me deal with this.”

“Mm. So unfair. I know how it feels.”

“What were you saying about serving balls into faces? Want to meet up and stand on the other side of the net?”

“I’ll pass,” Tooru said. He smiled. “Thanks, Iwa-chan.”

“You’re not welcome. Bye, Oikawa.”

The smile just wouldn’t leave. “Bye, Iwa-chan.”

  


Heartened by the conversation with Iwaizumi, Tooru found the energy to shower—again—and get dressed, knowing he would sleep the day away and wake up with a headache if he stayed in his room much longer. Plus, there was a part of him that couldn’t stay still.

He attended his next class, which he’d thought of skipping, then ended up wandering. Practice was off today, and the evening stretched out before Tooru, completely empty when he wanted it to be full. His phone was heavy in his pocket, telling him to call someone, but the restlessness he felt kept him from committing to any one person.

Or rather, the only person he wanted to call was Ushijima, but the thought of calling or texting Ushijima embarrassed him too much to do it.

Was he twelve again? Incapable of talking to a crush? Maybe.

The smell of roasting meat drew Tooru off campus. He paused, looking around him. People were dressed up, some of them in yukatas. Was it a festival day? How had he missed that?

He heard the bang of taiko and the rattle of pellet drums, and let them lead him to the festival ground like he was a spirit to be summoned. The heat in the air and the music, underpinned by the hum of conversation, became a river flowing around him. Here and there he saw people he knew, but he didn’t stop to talk, and they didn’t see or recognise him. Fair enough; lately, he didn’t always recognise himself. He passed a stall selling takoyaki, and the smell of it made his mouth water, making Tooru realize he hadn’t eaten all day. He had a little money in his pocket; he spent it and ate ravenously, nearly drunk off the indulgence and variety of festival food. Everything felt more vibrant than usual: the buzz of people around him, the scents and sizzle of food, the laughter of children running underfoot, the pop of lights as the evening came on. He couldn’t help but feel that he’d never experienced a day quite like this one, that he’d never seen the world through such eyes.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. Tooru somehow knew who it was before he even looked at the screen—it felt like that kind of evening, with the fairytale quality of a lucid dream.

Ushijima had messaged him. _/Oikawa, are you busy this evening?/_

_/No, I’m at the festival./_

_/May I join you?/_

Tooru’s mouth felt dry. His hands shook slightly as he typed his reply. _/I’ll be waiting for you in front of the park next to the bridge./_ Ordinarily he’d strike a coquettish tone or add emoji, but it didn’t feel right in this case.

He kept his hands balled up in his pockets as he waited by the bridge, trying to hang onto the serene mood the festival had put him in—but his body was determined to get nervous. His palms sweated and his heart beat fast.

This was ridiculous. He was still him, wasn’t he? Yet he didn’t want to joke around just now, and being honest—being serious—left him feeling vulnerable. How did Ushijima cope all the time, meaning every word he said? It was a terrifying way to live.

“Oikawa.”

Tooru looked up, almost smiling. He couldn’t help remembering how the sound of his name in that voice used to rile him up like nobody’s business.

“Ushiwaka,” Tooru said. “Shall we start things off on the right foot? I’m sorry for what I said after you stood up for me. Again. You didn’t deserve that.”

Ushijima made a dismissive gesture, then said—with more hesitation than he’d showed in all the time Tooru had known him—“Can we… talk?”

Tooru nodded and led him to a secluded area he’d looked at earlier, on a small wooded path. The lights and the hubbub from the festival were near, but they weren’t overpowering.

“I mean it,” Tooru said, turning to face Ushijima. His arms were folded. “I keep saying the worst things, and it’s fine when you know I don’t mean them, but—”

“The best,” Ushijima interrupted, voice low. Tooru’s mouth snapped shut. Had Ushijima grown a few inches? He looked taller—or maybe he was standing closer than he normally did.

“You said you’d make me the best player I could be. Did you mean that?”

Tooru let out a breath. “Seya-chan again.”

Ushijima nodded.

That was why he’d called Iwaizumi this morning? It made little sense to Tooru, but he’d decided to be honest today, to try not to hide behind the evasions that came so easily to him; that included not always answering questions with questions. “I meant it.”

Ushijima’s head dropped so Tooru could no longer read his expressions—or what passed for expressions on Ushijima’s face. Tooru wrung his hands, not sure what to do with them or what to say.

 _Don’t get over me_ , he wanted to say, but how could he say it when it made him feel like such a loser?

“Anyway,” he said instead, shooing away the previous topic with a wave of his hand. “Thank you for standing up for me. Even if I was so horrible about it after.”

Ushijima shook his head, finally looking up again. “I don’t care about that. If anything, I did it for my own sake. Oikawa, do you— ” Ushijima tracked off in another rare show of hesitation. It didn’t seem like he knew what to do with his hands either.

“Do I…?”

Ushijima took a breath and faced him. “Do you still feel as you did months ago? My feelings are the same as they were, but I will not bother you with them any longer if they are unwelcome.”

Tooru’s body went weak with relief. He wanted to sit down, or at the very least lean on something. “Good,” he managed. “That’s good.”

Ushijima’s face was unreadable, and Tooru realized it was unclear whether he was responding to the _my feelings are the same_ part or the _I won’t bother you anymore_ part. His breath caught.

“I don’t feel the same as I did,” Tooru said. He had to look away, his gaze catching on a stream of lanterns. “Not at all.”

He felt a light touch on his arm. Tooru looked down and saw Ushijima’s impossibly large hand, his broad fingers gentle against Tooru’s skin. He quickly realized that Ushijima had never touched him like this. It felt as though static electricity emanated from the contact between them, trilling up his arm and leaving goosebumps in its wake.

“Oikawa,” Ushijima said, so close that Tooru felt his low timbre rumble through his chest. “Do you mean to say—”

“I like you,” Tooru bit out quickly. His eyes flicked up to meet Ushijima’s. He found those dark eyes staring back at him, intent and pressing and so, so hopeful. “Quite a bit, really.”

Ushijima’s eyebrows knit together. “As… a friend?” he asked hesitantly.

It was such an unusually apprehensive reaction that Tooru had to smile in return. _Not good with subtext_ , he thought to himself, with an internal roll of his eyes. He’d have to remember that in the future. Still, Ushijima’s obvious nervousness helped calm his own anxiety. He took hold of Ushijima’s wrist on the hand against his arm and pulled it away. Then, he lifted his other hand and pressed it into Ushijima’s, palm to palm, fingers aligned. He did have calluses, Tooru noted.

Ushijima watched as he did so, eyes fixed on the hands between them.

“No, Ushiwaka,” Tooru said. “Not as a friend.”

Ushijima’s eyes shot up, meeting his again. Tooru realized he was blushing—he was actually blushing!—and then realized his own cheeks were burning too. Couldn’t be helped, he supposed. It was too late not to make an idiot of himself. Tooru lowered his gaze to their hands. He pivoted his wrist slightly, turning his palm so he could slide his fingers between Ushijima’s. He closed his hand, tightening his fingers until Ushijima slowly followed suit.

“I like you,” Tooru murmured to their linked hands.

Ushijima didn’t speak. He was silent for so long that Tooru felt a twinge of uneasiness. It wasn’t possible that he’d misunderstood, right?

“Oikawa,” Ushijima said once more, in such a tone that Tooru had to close his eyes.

“Yes?” he whispered.

“May I touch your hair?”

Tooru opened his eyes again in surprise. He let out a breathless laugh. That was twice he’d expected Ushijima to kiss him, and twice he’d been wrong. “My hair?”

Ushijima nodded. “It is my favorite of your features.” His eyes turned aside. “I have admired it for a long time,” he said softly.

“Oh!” Tooru’s heart thudded fast. Somehow it felt like they had jumped at least two levels of intimacy. Leave it to Ushijima to go straight for the kill. “Um.” He laughed nervously. “If you like.”

Ushijima stepped closer. He was so large he almost filled Tooru’s entire range of vision. He smelled as though he had just showered. Ushijima lifted his free hand to the side of Tooru’s head.

His touch was light, tentative. Tooru barely felt it at all. It was a tickle of sensation near his ear, like a breath of wind. Then, slowly, Ushijima slid his fingers into Tooru’s hair, around the back of his head. As the rough pads of his fingertips caught against Tooru’s scalp, Tooru fought the delicious shiver that slipped down his spine.

Tooru watched Ushijima’s face. It was more open and expressive than he had ever seen—lips slightly parted, eyebrows lifted in a curious turn. His gaze was fixed at a point above Tooru’s forehead.

The moment stretched, relativity in play as seconds became minutes; it felt like an hour before Ushijima lowered his eyes and met Tooru’s. “Oikawa,” he said. He cleared his throat. Tooru had never known him to clear his throat before. “Do you… May I…”

“This is _ridiculous_!” Tooru blurted in desperation. He grabbed Ushijima’s collar and pulled him forward.

At first, Ushijima seemed to freeze as Tooru kissed him—then the hand on the back of Tooru’s head relaxed, curling possessively into his hair. Tooru slipped his hand from Ushijima’s collar to tightly grasp the front of his shirt. Ushijima didn’t lead, but he followed willingly, responding to Tooru’s kiss with a tentative, earnest quality that wreaked havoc on Tooru. His senses were perfectly tuned; he could feel the hammer of his heart and hear the buzz of the festival; he was hyperaware of the warmth and solidity of Ushijima against him. He clung tighter as his knees went weak, breath going shuddery with the sensation of that hand tangling in his hair.

They parted, but Ushijima didn’t pull away. Tooru pulled their joined hands apart so he could slide both arms up over Ushijima’s shoulders. “You’re probably the dumbest person I’ve ever met,” Tooru mumbled against his lips.

“My grades are more than adequate,” Ushijima said. His newly freed hand found its way to the small of Tooru’s back. “I exceed the required average for club membership eligibility.”

Tooru wondered if Ushijima was really that literal or whether he was teasing. Perhaps he’d find out in time; he was too aware of the hand on his back to think straight right now. That hand was keeping him in place at the moment, but he could imagine it pulling him in, the strength behind Ushijima’s hold, how it would feel impossible to resist. There was a flush throughout his body.

“I imagine you exceed by more,” Ushijima conceded.

“I’m pretty much perfect,” Tooru said, somewhat breathless. His heart wasn’t in it.

Amazingly, Ushijima smiled. “Yes.”

Tooru could imagine himself getting pretty conceited if things continued like this, but he couldn’t help fishing for compliments. “Oh?”

“You are smart, athletic, and handsome.”

Even Tooru couldn’t take that level of unabashed praise—not from someone other than himself, at least. “You haven’t mentioned my personality being awful.”

“You are… colorful. That is not a bad thing.”

“Colorful,” Tooru repeated, smiling to himself. He couldn’t quite look Ushijima in the eye. He couldn’t believe any of this was happening, not really. In some alternate universe he still hated Ushijima like he was supposed to, and he certainly wasn’t enjoying the thought of Ushijima thinking he was _colorful_.

“You disagree?”

Tooru shook his head. “No. I just think your view of me is skewed.” Ushijima opened his mouth, and Tooru put his finger to Ushijima’s lips before he could ruin anything. “I’m a fan of that, don’t get me wrong. Please continue thinking I’m perfect.”

“I will,” Ushijima said, with confidence. Tooru let out a breath. The festival was still within earshot, the lights visible between breaks in the trees, and they were lucky no one else had stumbled upon their interlude just yet. Still… they were uninterrupted so far, and Ushijima’s arms were still around him. Tooru chanced it and leaned forward again. This time, Ushijima was ready for him.

It wasn’t much longer before the bubble around them burst; a pair of young boys came thundering down the path, shouting at each other as they ran. They were loud enough to give ample warning to their arrival, and by the time the boys came into view Tooru had separated himself from Ushijima. Only a lingering flushed breathlessness was left to give them away.

They returned to the festival together, standing close as they walked and chatted. Tooru laughed when Ushijima admitted he’d never had a candied apple and then treated him to one—“It’s very sweet,” had been Ushijima’s only review, though he ate nearly the whole thing. The last few bites he offered to Tooru, who took them tentatively. His teeth clicked through the red candy coating into the crunch of apple beneath. When he looked up, Ushijima was watching him. He had a fleck of apple on his cheek. Tooru lifted a hand to flick it away, and found that the hand didn’t go up in flames. No holy fire descended on him for the crime of touching Ushijima, though part of him still expected it.

It was almost midnight by the time they made it back to campus. Ushijima walked with him to his dorm building while the night grew soft and close around them. The grass was already damp with dew. It would be foggy in the morning, Tooru knew.

At the exterior door of his building, Tooru stopped and turned to face Ushijima. The campus was quiet; no one was around at the moment. Perhaps most students were still at the festival, or down at bars on the strip. Those who were more studious or less social were certainly already in their rooms, and Tooru knew he’d probably find his roommate upstairs in theirs.

“I guess this is where we say goodnight,” Tooru said. Tomorrow they’d have class and practice as usual. He wasn’t quite sure how he was supposed to go back to a normal schedule when he felt that the world had been so altered.

“Yes,” Ushijima said. “We have morning practice before classes.”

“Don’t remind me,” Tooru groaned. Away from the dreamlike setting of the festival, he was back to feeling a little nervous, unsure how to properly end their evening together.

Ushijima didn’t seem to share his uncertainty. He stepped forward and took hold of one of Tooru’s hands. His thumb brushed over Tooru’s knuckles. “I look forward to sharing breakfast with you again,” Ushijima said in a quiet voice.

Tooru felt a pang somewhere inside. It was so dumb, he thought. No way anyone was this genuine on accident. No one but Ushijima.

“You can have the last strawberry milk from now on,” Tooru said.

Ushijima’s mouth turned up in a small smile. His eyes met Tooru’s. “Until tomorrow, then,” he said.

Tooru nodded. _Kiss me, you idiot,_ he thought, and to his great surprise, Ushijima finally did. A large warm hand curled around Tooru’s side. Tooru thought about how it might feel without his shirt in the way.

Ushijima pulled back. “Goodnight, Oikawa,” he said.

“Goodnight, Ushiwaka-chan,” Tooru returned, lilting the nickname slightly, which earned him another small smile. He squeezed Ushijima’s hand, then let him go.

He stood next to the door while Ushijima walked away, watching until the broad-shouldered back disappeared from view as it slipped out of the glow of the lamplit path and into the dark. Then Tooru went inside, climbed the stairs to his floor, and entered his dorm room as though waking slowly from a dream.

His roommate was playing a shooter on his computer; he wore a headset and argued with unseen individuals. He inclined his head as Tooru came in but gave no more greeting. That was fine, Tooru didn’t want to talk to him. He wasn’t ready yet to pretend that nothing out of the ordinary had just happened to him. Tooru crossed to his bed and laid down on the on top of the covers in his clothes. He pulled out his phone.

 _/You were right/_ he messaged Iwaizumi.

 _/Right how?/_ came the reply.

_/I’m totally making you hang out with him./_


	3. Epilogue

In the weeks that followed the festival, some things changed, but most things didn’t. Tooru attended his classes, he went to practice, he visited home during holidays. He resumed breakfast with Ushijima every morning. On the outside, the difference in these breakfasts from those they shared when Tooru was trying to torment Ushijima would seem minimal. But the shrewd observer might notice the overabundance of smiling from either party, the way their legs would casually rest together under the table.

The All-Japan Intercollegiate was coming up in December, and so volleyball began to take up a larger and larger portion of Tooru’s life, but he had no complaints on this issue. Every moment on the court was an opportunity that he took seriously. He had no plans to waste any more of them.

Sure, he often ended practice with an intense necking session in the locker room when the rest of their team had gone, but Ushijima was one of the few people who could match his determination to succeed—more than half of those trysts had been cut short in order to spend a few more minutes at practice before they had to break for dinner. He and Ushijima were not yet likely to start in official games, but the gap was narrowing.

Whenever they did substitute for the regulars in official matches, Tooru found he could measure his own success by the heat in Ushijima’s gaze after the end of a match. A current passed between them on the court and off, an awareness that shrank the distance between them to nothing regardless of where they stood—an awareness that left Tooru flustered more often than he cared to admit. It was fine if he was focused, but the moment that focus dropped…

“Oikawa.”

Tooru straightened, pulled from contemplating the pavement as he walked back to the student residences with Ushijima. They’d been the last to leave practice again, and the world had gone dark and October-night-cold while Tooru was exhausting himself with serve after serve. Ushijima had been the one to pull him away from that, possibly by Iwaizumi’s urging. Was that possible? Were they friendly enough to share custody? He still wasn’t sure.

“Can I help you?” Tooru asked, sticking his hands further into his pockets. His damp hair cooled him uncomfortably; he needed to start putting a hat in his gym bag to keep him warm after, when the sun was down.

“In ways, yes,” Ushijima replied with the literal bent Tooru had come to rely on.

“Anything specific?” he asked, quashing sudden impatience. He was half-mad these days, always caught between trying to seem unaffected and wanting more.

“Would you accompany me?”

“Uh?”

“To my room. Would you accompany me?”

A tickle raced down Tooru’s chest to spread through his body. “Oh?” he said, trying to keep his voice in a low octave.

Ushijima nodded, seeming to take this interest as an affirmative. It was, too; instead of parting ways like usual, Tooru found himself following Ushijima back to his room, barely able to keep a blush from his cheeks.

 _This is not an illicit meeting_ , he reminded himself. _He probably wants me to look at some weird thing he collects._ To keep himself busy, Tooru guessed what things Ushijima would collect. Coins? Stamps? No—rocks. It would be rocks. In the couple of months they’d been dating, Tooru still hadn’t found any real hobbies that his boyfriend indulged in—save, of course, for hiking near his home with Sugar and Salt in tow. Not that Ushijima seemed to mind being included the various things Tooru was interested in—movies and television and, if he left a book in Ushijima’s bag, Ushijima would bring it back to him a week later and give him a detailed account of his appreciation. So he wasn’t really sure what he expected to find in Ushijima’s dorm room.

That is—he wasn’t sure what he expected, but he knew what he didn’t: what he didn’t expect, when Ushijima opened the door, was to see Iseya lounging on one of the twin beds while reading a textbook. Tooru pulled up short, almost sputtering in his displeasure.

Iseya gave him no more than a quirked brow in response.

If Tooru had borne any lingering hopes the invitation to Ushijima’s room was salacious in nature, they certainly evaporated upon that sight. Tooru managed to gather himself enough to point directly at Iseya’s face, turn toward his boyfriend entering the room behind him, and demand, “What is _he_ doing here?”

“I live here,” Iseya said.

“What?”

Ushijima looked unmoved. “Iseya and I are roommates,” he said mildly, as though it were an unimportant tidbit of known information, such as _the sky is blue_ or _fire is hot_.

“You’re _roommates_?”

Ushijima nodded.

“And neither of you thought about telling me this?”

Iseya shrugged. “Does it matter?”

It explained why Iseya had been so annoyingly over-invested in Ushijima’s affairs, for one. Tooru waved a hand. “Oh, no. Why tell me things?”

Ushijima seemed to take this at face value while Iseya laughed. “You hate not holding all the cards, huh?” Iseya said.

Tooru glowered. “I hate people not minding their own business. I thought you were just some sprite sent to torture me, or something.”

Iseya’s expression sobered, and he indicated Ushijima. “You didn’t have to deal with this guy mooning over you.”

“Mooning,” Ushijima said contemplatively, not like it offended him but like he was trying to figure out if the word fit. He didn’t seem to object to it after a moment of consideration, because he said nothing more.

“I didn’t ask to be beautiful,” Tooru said dismissively, hoping to end the subject. The thought of those early days of misunderstandings still filled him with embarrassment.

“You would’ve if you’d had a choice, though,” Iseya said, and he closed his textbook with a snap and pushed himself off the bed. “Okay. Library time. You two behave.”

“Wh—” Tooru started, but he stopped himself. Who was he to stop Iseya from leaving if he wanted to?

“Thank you,” Ushijima said as Iseya packed a bag. Iseya left with a salute, and Tooru wasn’t sure if he was meant to feel nervous or exhilarated. Was this…?

“Iseya knew I had something to show you,” Ushijima said. “He volunteered to leave. Sit, please.”

Right. Okay. Something to show him. Tooru reigned in his imagination, perching on the side of a desk instead of one of the chairs. He watched Ushijima retrieve something from a set of drawers —a book?

Ushijima placed it in Tooru’s hands and hovered, clearly excited. It wasn’t an excitement that showed in his face, but the nearness and the energy in his posture produced something almost like a hum—a laser-like focus that bored into Tooru. Even after months of dating, Ushijima’s energy could be intimidating.

Tooru opened the book and saw careful, handwritten notes. It was a journal, then, not a novel, with the owner’s name written in large characters on the front page—Ushijima Soushirou. The paper felt soft and old. Tooru leafed through the first few pages—and encountered painstaking drawings of constellations, with notes in the margins. Given the Ushijima name, Tooru expected only observations with a solid scientific bent to them, going no further than the known, but when he read a paragraph he found himself sucked in.

 _If what we see is old light, it means we are looking into the past of other civilizations_ , Ushijima Soushirou wrote in a steady hand. _Are any of them headed to Earth? What would tempt them here? Resources? Abundance of oxygen and water in a carbon-based system? What requirements would life on other planets have, and would they be different from our own? Is there a force that keeps other planets from contacting us? Does some alien life form millions of years from now look at the light from my star at this very moment and wonder about me?_

“This belonged to your grandfather?” Tooru asked, tearing himself away.

“Yes. My grandmother remembered it when I asked about fixing the telescope. I thought you would enjoy it.”

Tooru closed the book. “It’s less scientific than I expected.”

Ushijima smiled. “Again you expect all the things around me to be boring.” Once upon a time, there would have been an edge to that statement—but Tooru’s change of heart had made it clear enough that whatever he thought of Ushijima’s interests, he didn’t find Ushijima himself boring. The obvious passion Ushijima felt for _him_ had helped with that.

“I expect you and your line to be grounded,” Tooru said. “Maybe your grandmother is the steady one.”

“Maybe,” Ushijima said. He was standing very close, head bent. “Do you like it?”

“Of course I like it, but I’m not going to read it with you breathing down my neck. Have you read it?”

“Of course. I found myself thinking that you would get along with my grandfather better than I did.”

“A poetic soul like my own,” Tooru joked, though as always Ushijima took it as meant. Tooru put the journal down on the desk behind him. “Thank you for showing me.”

When he looked up, he was struck again by Ushijima’s energy and nearness. Tooru kept his face turned away, caught by that unsettled feeling that happened when Ushijima was at his most intent. It was like standing under a waterfall.

“So this _was_ a ploy to get me back to your place?” he asked, body warming. Ushijima smelled like the cold from outside and the clean, masculine scent Tooru was used to.

“Do I scheme?” Ushijima asked. He touched a hand to the side of Tooru’s face. Even without looking, Tooru knew there would be a slight smile accompanying the light tone of Ushijima’s voice.

“No. You’re disgustingly up front.” Tooru glanced up at last, bolstered by comforting antagonism. “I hate it.”

“You do,” Ushijima agreed, and the other hand came up. Tooru let himself be drawn in, head tipping back to allow a slow, ardent kiss that gained momentum as it deepened, pressing Tooru back into the desk he leaned against. Long moments passed, and Tooru regretted that they were still dressed for outside; his body was hot and flushed beneath his winter clothes. He was breathless by the time their contact was interrupted by the whine of the desk moving slightly on the linoleum floor.

Ushijima moved back, seeming to realize how hard he’d been pressing into Tooru, and Tooru stood. This time it was his turn to push, and Ushijima went willingly, letting Tooru back him up onto his bed, making it easy for him except with his eyes, which continued to hold a challenge. Or was that just his face? Tooru could never be sure, but he knew it made him feel smug to see those eyes below him looking up, waiting for him to make a move.

“I hate it,” Tooru repeated. The smirk he wore probably ruined any chance of Ushijima believing it, but then, he didn’t want Ushijima to misunderstand him here.

“You’ll have to bear with it,” Ushijima said. His posture said he could wait forever for Tooru to come down, but his hands plucked at the bottom Tooru’s jacket, unconsciously trying to pull him close.

Tooru leaned down, keeping a hand on Ushijima’s shoulder to stop him from meeting him in the middle. “I intend to,” he said, still smug. If the universe was going to punish him, Tooru was determined to enjoy his punishment. He knew that would be the best revenge of all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has read/kudos'd/commented/shared with friends! We've been so excited to share this with you. We had so much fun writing it and we hope that you enjoyed reading. If you liked it and have the inclination, please tell us your favorite parts so we can re-enjoy. Have a great day!

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